Towering Retribution
by Arrowfoot the Dragon
Summary: Sequel to "Spirits of the Past": Two years have passed since Evan and Jenna faced the spirits of the Old Chateau. Now, when misfortune strikes the Lavender Radio Tower, the two must come together to face a new challenge. Needn't have read SotP to enjoy.
1. Old Acquaintances

Disclaimer: Oh, I did miss all these disclaimers about imaginary pokemon friends and computers and mangoes... Anyway, I'm getting off topic. I do not own pokemon in any way, shape, or form; however, if I one day take over the world and/or become an incredibly talented bio-engineer, then genetically engineering the first real pokemon will be first on my list of things to do.

* * *

**Towering Retribution**

Part One: Old Acquaintances

Rock music suddenly filled the otherwise quiet room, making Jenna jump slightly. It took her a second to realize that her phone was ringing; she didn't get too many calls, so her confusion was at least somewhat justified. In another second Jenna had dropped her piece of pizza she'd been eating, grabbed a napkin, and wiped the grease off of her hands. Her rush was more out of curiosity than courtesy; she gave very few people her number, and most of them didn't call just to say hello. Of course, she doubted that this particular call would world-changing, but at the very least, it might disrupt the current monotony of her life.

"Hello?" she asked, remembering belatedly that she should have checked the caller I.D. before answering.

"Is that you, Jenna? It's been so long since I've talked to you that I hardly recognize your voice. Anyway, this is Evan. Do you remember me?"

It took Jenna a few moments to place him, but then the name and the voice clicked. The recognition caused her to shiver briefly, as if it had been two days since she had last seen Evan, rather than the true two years.

"Yeah, I remember," Jenna replied. "I haven't seen you since that whole fiasco at the Old Chateau. Not to be rude, but why call now?"

There was a brief pause. "Well, to be perfectly honest, I need to talk with you about something. Preferably face to face. You wouldn't happen to be anywhere in the area of Eterna, would you?"

Definitely intrigued by the conversation, Jenna answered, "Yeah. I'm in Jubilife right now. Half a day's flying on Flame – you know, my charizard. I'm pretty sure you met her. Anyway, point is, I can leave in the morning and be there in the afternoon. That sound good?"

"That's great," Evan said, sounding relieved. "Just meet me at my house, then we can go somewhere for lunch: my treat."

"Um, all right then. Guess I'll see you tomorrow?"

"Yep, see you then." Then Evan hung up, leaving Jenna alone in her pokemon center room to wonder about the conversation. What in the world was going on? Why in the world was Evan calling her now, after two years of no communication whatsoever? Were things not finished at the Old Chateau – had some other ghosts come to haunt it, perhaps?

Though she wasn't planning on saying no to any change of pace, she didn't like the idea of going to the Old Chateau again. Jenna still had nightmares concerning her possession by one of the spirits there; regularly, she would dream that the malevolent ghost of the butler was still following her, just waiting to possess her once again. The ghost had caused chaos during the first possession, and Jenna had no desire to relive the experience.

Whatever the case, Jenna knew she would have to wait until tomorrow to hear what Evan needed to say. So she went to sleep, doing her best to ignore the racing of her mind.

:::::::::::::

When Evan opened his door the following afternoon, he recognized the appearance of Jenna just about as much as he had recognized her voice over the phone. The sixteen-year-old girl had changed much from the young, almost arrogant fourteen-year-old he remembered. Her brown hair, once very long and free flowing, was now shoulder-length and tied back in a ponytail. She'd gained several inches in height, too, so that she was now very nearly eye-to-eye with Evan. Jenna had also grown up in other ways, he couldn't help but notice; undoubtedly, she seemed very different from the child he remembered.

From Jenna's perspective, Evan had changed little. He still had the same brown eyes and hair; he hadn't grown at all since their last encounter; and age-wise, he looked almost exactly the same as he had two years ago. He was not at all unattractive, though she hadn't made this observation the last time they had met; even so, he was probably several years older, and Jenna didn't remember liking his attitude during the Old Chateau incident. Of course, her bias against him was perhaps strengthened by the fact that he had been right to believe in ghosts, while Jenna herself had been stupid enough to get herself possessed.

"There's a new restaurant on this side of town that I thought we might try," Evan said, skipping greetings entirely. "It's nothing fancy, but I've heard they've got some great burgers."

"I've been living on bad fast food and pokemon center breakfast buffets for a while now - some good burgers sound great." Jenna said, truthfully. She was starting to realize just how nice something unexpected like this meeting was. She'd been training almost nonstop for almost the past month, unable to think of anything else better to do. As it turns out, once you've saved the world from Palkia and beaten the champion of Sinnoh, there's really not much else that your life can climax to.

They chatted for a while on their walk to the restaurant, but it wasn't until they were seated and waiting for their meal that Jenna finally let curiosity overtake her. "So… Why did you need to see me so badly?"

Evan sighed. "Well, it's not too complicated, though perhaps somewhat silly. I've been hired to help with what I suspect to be a big paranormal investigation into the new radio tower in Lavender town, over in Kanto. They asked me after hearing about what we were able to accomplish with the Old Chateau, and I think this case will be just as big as that one was."

"That doesn't seem too silly. But why contact me? I'm sure you're perfectly competent at handling ghosts," Jenna said.

"That's the silly part, I suppose," Evan said, not meeting Jenna's eyes. "You see... The morning I was called up to investigate this case, but before I actually knew anything at all about it, I had a strong feeling that I needed to talk to you about something. To be completely honest, I hadn't really thought about you much in particular over the last year or so; at least, no more than I thought about the entire situation at the Old Chateau. Then, when I did finally get the call, I thought of asking you to come along almost immediately.

"Being involved with the supernatural, I learned long ago to trust my instincts. They're normally right. I have a feeling that either you'll help out with this case, or it will be important in the long run that you come along for it."

Jenna looked at him incredulously for a few moments, then laughed a little bit. "Well, it's an interesting idea," she replied, "though I doubt I could help at all."

"Don't be so sure," Evan said, a gleam in his eye. "Though it was a slightly different situation last time, I think that you can sense ghosts' emotions better than most, and even communicate with them. And it's always helpful to have a channeler around when dealing with ghosts."

Jenna seemed surprised; she'd never once pictured herself a channeler. "Back up a moment. I thought you were a channeler. Why would you need another one?"

Evan shrugged. "To be honest, I'm more of a psychic than a channeler."

"What's the difference?"

"Psychics can exorcize ghosts and communicate with psychic type pokemon, to some extent. But I'm hopeless at training ghost-types, and can't talk with a ghost to save my life," Evan explained.

Jenna let the implications hit her. "Even so, if that means I have to let another ghost posses me to communicate, then I'm out. I still feel haunted by that psychopath butler."

"Haunted?" Evan asked, his brows knitting together.

"It's just an expression," Jenna said, trying to brush off his obvious concern. "I've just kept on having nightmares about it; that's all."

Evan scowled even more. "I wish I'd known about that earlier. That could potentially be a problem." Then, loosening up, he said, "Still, you don't need to worry about that now. It shouldn't be an immediate issue. So, what about the radio tower case? Are you in? And I promise, I won't make you channel any ghosts if you don't want to."

This time, it was Jenna's turn to sigh. "I've been so bored lately that I'd even face Mr. Psycho Butler again for some action. Plus, I've never been out of Sinnoh before. I'm in."

Evan smiled. "I'm glad. We'll take the train in the morning, and leave for Kanto by ship, all expenses paid by Lavender Radio Corporation. And from there, to the building known once as Pokemon Tower."

* * *

I suddenly got an urge to write a sequel to _Spirits of the Past_, inspired in part by the discovery that Pokemon Tower was, for some reason, made into a radio tower. This is BLASPHEMY! How dare the game designers do such a thing! Pokemon Tower was one of the best places in the Kanto region! And no, I had never played the Johto generation until HG/SS came out, so this is rather recent news to me.

Anyway, though I've recently been attempting to avoid fanfics in favor of original stories, I've found that I really need to get pumped about writing something again. Creative ruts make me depressed, which makes me sad (of course), which in turn makes me further dislike creative ruts. So I thought I'd give fanfics another shot as a way to get my mood back up. If this anti-rut plan works, then in addition to this being a sequel, it might also be a prequel to a full-length pokemon fanfic. And when I talk full-length, I _mean_ full length (refer to Books 1 and 2 of my fanfic _A Possibility of Evil). _

Also... go to poketto[dot]proboards[dot]com, if you want a small (but good) pokemon forum. It's really nice, though I must admit I haven't felt the motivation to get on recently.

EDIT: Did some edits to speech tags. Thanks to Farla for the suggestion! I'm sure it's still far from perfect (I generally have an awkward time with that particular part of writing), but it's hopefully at least a little better. Also, note that Evan is OLDER than Jenna, not younger; I didn't catch my typo until just now. Any other comments and critiques are very much appreciated!


	2. Arrival

Disclaimer: I don't own pokemon. If I did, I would already know the legends and starters of the fifth generation, which in turn would let me laugh at all of you who will probably still have to wait for months more before they are revealed. Sadly, as this is not the case, I am left in as much suspense as you.

* * *

**Towering Retribution**

Part 2: Arrival

Jenna and Evan had been en route to Kanto for the last couple of days now. The Radio Tower Corporation had spared no expense to transport them quickly and comfortably: they each had their room on one of the fastest, most sought-after cruise ships in the world. In a couple of hours, they would dock at Vermillion City, and a quick train ride from there would see them to Lavender well before night.

Currently, however, the two were in Evan's room on the ship, trying to figure out the source of the nightmares Jenna had mentioned several days earlier.

The feather on Natu's head stood straight up as it stared unblinkingly at Jenna. "Natu," it chirped blandly.

"So... What's your natu saying?" Jenna asked.

Evan shook his head. "Neither of us are sure about what's haunting you," he responded. "You definitely have some entity following you; if it's the butler, then his power is greatly diminished. On the other hand, seeing as you might have channeler capabilities, your own supernatural abilities might have created a poltergeist."

"What? A poltergeist?" Jenna asked.

"It's a spirit that was never alive, often created by psychics who don't use their talents," Evan explained. "Poltergeists don't really think, or have feelings other than what its creator might unwittingly pass on to it. Normally, they just cause trouble - shaking stuff around that ought to be standing still, throwing small objects, etcetera. In your case, it gives you nightmares, at least at the level it's at now."

Jenna didn't particularly like the sound of either option. "So what can I do about it?"

"If it's a poltergeist, I can exorcise it," Evan offered. "On the other hand, if it really is the old ghost, then he might be lingering within your own soul, if you want to call it that. In that case, I doubt I can do anything about it."

"Well, can we at least try the exorcism, then?" Jenna asked, her voice tinged with worry.

"You mean now?" Jenna nodded her head in response. Evan scowled, then shrugged. "Well, I guess it can't hurt. Let's go ahead and start."

Evan called out his pair of chimecho, and after setting up some cleanse tags around the room, he was ready to attempt the exorcism. Once it started, the chimecho chimed in unison, their bell-like tolling creating a simple tune that was both calming and eerie. Evan bowed his head as he placed his hand on Jenna's head, making Jenna feel more than just a bit awkward. Evan's natu was still on his head, staring upon the scene with its unblinking eyes. Jenna imagined it had to be quite the odd scene: a small exorcism, taking place in a slightly cramped room on a ship.

After about a minute or two of this, Evan withdrew his hand and the chimecho quit ringing. "So?" Jenna asked anxiously. "What happened?"

"Na. Tu."

"According to natu, the presence is still there," Evan interpreted. "While I could be wrong, I'm thinking that means that the butler is still hanging around."

Jenna's hopes sank. "What do I do now, then? Just wait for him to possess me again?"

"Firstly, don't worry about it too much. Fear gives power to malignant ghosts," Evan instructed. "Secondly, he won't be able to possess you again too easily. He'd have to gain strength, then separate himself from you; even once that happens, if it happens, he'd have to wait for another 'invitation' from you to take control again."

Jenna was going to make a response, but was cut off as the captain's voice rang out over the intercom system: "Good afternoon, passengers. We will be arriving at our destination within the next half-hour. Please make sure your bags are packed, and we hope you had an enjoyable cruise."

Jenna sighed, resigning herself to the fact that there was nothing else she could do. "Okay, whatever. I'll go pack my bags. But if I go suddenly nuts again like at the Old Chateau, you're taking the blame."

IIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIII

"Director, would you please tell us everything you know about the hauntings." No sooner had the duo arrived in Lavender Town than Evan insisted on going to the radio tower, to check in with their employer. It truly was 'their' employer, to Jenna's surprise; Evan had arranged for both of them to be paid for this job. Faced with this knowledge, Jenna had no choice but to come along, no matter how much she wanted to freshen up at the pokemon center. Currently, all three of them - Jenna, Evan, and the director of the radio tower - were in the director's spacious office near the top of the tower.

The director hesitated before responding to Evan's question; he'd been covering up the hauntings for so long now that he wasn't easily able to adjust to telling someone the entire story. "It began when we started remodeling the tower three years ago, I suppose," he started with a sigh. "We cleared out all of the pokemon residing in the tower before we began, ghost-types and all. But even then, pokemon kept showing up during construction. Not just any pokemon, mind you; some passed right through walls, even those that weren't ghost types, and others moved things or broke equipment.

"We continued with our radio tower plans nonetheless. Even once construction was finished, the apparitions continued. More recently, they've started attacking employees and visitors." The director paused for a moment, using a handkerchief to wipe some nervous sweat from him brow. "Since that started, we've more or less had to move our operations to the Silph Company building in Saffron City. We've tried to keep our reasoning behind this a secret, though so many of the employees had personal experiences seeing the ghosts that secrecy has been practically impossible. Aside from maintenance and some other brave workers that stay on the main floor, this building is all but functionless."

Evan scowled, eyebrows knitting together as they always did when he was pondering something supernatural. "That does seem to be quite the problem. I assume you've made sure that these aren't just illusions combined with attacks by ghost-type pokemon?"

"Yes. We had a less professional psychic come out, and she ensured us that these were actual spirits," the director said.

"We'll start our efforts on the matter first thing tomorrow, then," Evan replied. "Have there been any other unusual events going on here, perhaps not quite as glaringly obvious as the instances you have already mentioned?"

"There is one other thing that has worried me, though I blamed it on my paranoia more than anything," the director admitted, after some thought. "You see, over the course of the last three years, an unusually high amount of our employees have... well, to put it bluntly, they've died. No one has connected it to the haunting, though it has been a blow to our already low morale."

"How did they die?" Evan asked.

"All sorts of ways; you name it, and it probably happened to someone or other," the director responded. "Car crashes, accidents during the remodeling, pneumonia out of nowhere, drowning... All completely unrelated, but there have simply been too many overall to seem completely normal. Do you think it's related to the pokemon hauntings?"

Evan shook his head. "I'd say not, though being around ghosts all day can wear down a person's endurance, whether they know it or not; in theory, this could make them more prone to accidents or more susceptible to sickness. Normally, ghosts are bound to one place. Even if something paranormal could follow your employees, I see no way it could cause all those different things to happen."

The director let his breath out audibly, obviously relieved. "I'm glad to hear it, though it seems a terrible coincidence that so many would die so quickly. Anyway, I-"

A birdlike shriek interrupted the director mid-sentence. The three barely looked up in time to see a pidgeot pass straight _through_ the window, not even slowed by the solid barrier. The bird landed on the director's desk and faced Evan, its wings and body large enough and close enough to very nearly fill Jenna vision. From its perch on the desk, its head very nearly touched the ceiling, making Jenna guess that it had to be at least six or seven feet tall. At the very least, it was certainly larger than any staraptor she had seen in Sinnoh.

Jenna moved quickly to summon one of her pokemon, but there was no way she could beat a pidgeot in a contest of speed. The pidgeot lunged forward with a flap of its wings, its talons raking forward; Evan's own quick reaction time was the only thing that saved his face from being torn to shreds. Jenna had barely touched one of her pokeballs by the time the pidgeot disappeared, leaving the same way it had come.

With a horrible sense of guilt, Jenna thought that it was partially her fault that this had happened; for once in her life, she'd been too slow to call out a pokemon. If only she'd acted as soon as she had heard the _shree_ of the bird, as any great trainer normally would have. That was the only way she had been able to defeat Team Galactic, and Palkia, and Cynthia; her cool and quick mind in battle. Perhaps these months of relative inactivity had dulled her instincts.

Whatever the case, Jenna knew there was nothing she could do about it now. She turned slowly to look at her friend. Evan was grimacing in pain, looking at three crimson furrows clawed deeply into his forearm. Blood was already dripping steadily to the floor, like a rivulet from a faucet that someone had only partially turned off.

"Well," Evan said through clenched teeth, "I now see the extent of the problem; all the more reason to get to work as soon as possible."

* * *

All right, well, there's chapter two. I must admit, I rather liked the ending, though I wish I could have made the first thousand or so words of this chapter move a bit faster. Still, this is sort of how _Spirits of the Past_ went; the first couple chapters were rather slow, but after that, I really loved the action and suspense I got into. Which is perhaps a bit arrogant to say, since I _am_ the one who wrote it, but still.

Anyway, do note that a had a typo in chapter 1, if you read it before I caught it: Evan is several years _older_ than Jenna, not younger. Also, just in case you didn't already realize, Jenna is supposed to be the main female character from Pearl version. How many other people have defeated Palkia, after all?

Hope you're enjoying it! Trust me, I've got more than just a random angry ghost pidgeot in store for Jenna and Evan~! A fact which they probably won't appreciate, but they don't have much of a say in it.

EDIT: Sorry about the weird visual for the time break. I know for a fact that I had asterisks there to begin with, but for some reason, isn't letting me put them (or anything similar) into the story and save it. Go figure. Thanks for Redemmo for pointing out this problem, as well as multiple other issues in my other chapters.


	3. History of Sorrow

Disclaimer: I don't own anything except everything I own, which doesn't include the pokemon company, if that makes sense at all.

* * *

**Towering Retribution**

Part 3: History of Sorrow

Evan was rushed to the hospital, with several rolls of first-aid guaze around his arm to keep it from bleeding too heavily. After giving him some stitches, the doctors announced that he was well enough to go home, as long as he took it easy for the next day or so.

"I'll be taking the bus to my parents' house, now that that's all over," Evan said as he and Jenna exited the hospital. "You're staying at the pokemon center, right?"

"Wait... What? Your parents live here?"

Evan nodded. "I thought I already told you this. Then again, now that I think about it, that was way back during the Old Chateau investigation." He shrugged. "But yeah, I actually grew up here; that's sort of how I knew I was a psychic; I could distinguish the ghost-type pokemon of Pokemon Tower, who had figured out a way to pose as human spirits."

"Well, even if I'm staying at the pokemon center, I'm going to at least make sure you get home," Jenna insisted. "I can't let you just pass out somewhere in the street. Plus, I'm sure your parents have some embarrassing toddler stories that I could blackmail you with."

Evan half smiled and half grimaced, but didn't reject Jenna's proposal to come along; he didn't think it wise to trust his own body's strength after losing a good amount of blood. He felt fine on his way home, so maybe Jenna wasn't needed. Even so, he was glad for her company.

They hadn't even reached the front sidewalk when the door opened, and a middle-aged woman with the same eye and hair color as Evan came walking out. "Evan! It's been nearly a year since you came to visit; I'd been starting to think that you'd forgot about us here." Then she caught sight of his arm. "What in the world happened?"

"The new radio tower has quite the ghost problem," Evan replied simply, after giving his mom a quick hug.

"Well, Why, I-... I'd heard the rumors, of course, but I didn't quite believe them, really," the mother said as she ushered both Evan and Jenna inside. "Of course, with the history that the tower has, I suppose it's no wonder."

"History? What history?" Jenna asked as they entered the house, tired of feeling out the loop.

"It's a long, sad story," the mother said. "By the way, I'm Charlotte Farlowe, Evan's mother. Nice to meet you. You're helping Evan with his investigation, right?"

"Yeah," Jenna said, shaking the mom's hand. "I'm Jenna. Nice to meet you, too."

"And this is my father," Evan said as a man walked into the room; Jenna immediately saw the father-son connection. Other than being older than his son, their faces were nearly identical.

The man simply nodded, but he didn't come closer to shake hands.

Charlotte looked flustered. "Oh, if he's not going to introduce himself, then just call him Chad - everyone else does, even the little kids in the neighborhood, even though I doubt he's introduced himself even once to them, either. Now, Evan," she said, turning her attention to her son, "If you're hurt, you should really get as much rest as possible, I should think. It's already late; you're old bedroom is now the guest room, so you can sleep there."

"There's something I need to tell Jenna first, before she heads back to the pokemon center," Evan said. "Jenna, have you really not heard the legends of Pokemon Tower?"

"Nope, not really," Jenna said. "My mom would never let me watch scary shows as a kid. Go figure. I would like to know about it now, though, considering the circumstances."

All four of them settled themselves around the dining room table. Evan wanted his parents there to make sure he didn't miss any of the big details. Then, he began.

"It's really two legends combined into one: the first is the legend of the place itself. For as long as anyone can remember, and even past what recorded history shows, there has always been the Pokemon Tower here in Lavender Town. They say, even, that it was here before the first building of the town itself was built. It always has been a place to honor the dead, and to remember those gone. Sorrow is inherent to it's history."

"Not so, Evan," his mother interrupted before he could continue any farther. "Don't you remember your local history lessons? Until the past couple hundred years, people came from all over not to mourn the loss of departed friends, but to celebrate their lives. There was sorrow in it, too, by the nature of it; but for the most part, people came to it to honor those who had gone before them. A festival was even held once a year, as a special remembrance of the dearly departed."

Evan nodded. "Thanks for reminding me. It wasn't truly sad until, as my mother said, a couple hundred years ago. That's when our other myth comes into play: the Legend of the Marowak species. Many ancient cultures saw marowak and cubone bones as sacred, and used them in rituals and medicine. But to get the skull bones of either, the pokemon had to be killed. Cubone and marowak have been hunted to near extinction because of it.

"So, it's said that a family of marowak and cubone settled in and near Pokemon Tower some two or three hundred years ago. As soon as this was discovered, many people came here seeking either to use the bones for themselves or to sell them to the highest bidder. Thus, the tradition of sorrow in this town began.

"Most recently, the Tower had trouble with Team Rocket. They managed to poach a mother marowak when I was about seven or eight years old, I vaguely remember." He seemed to remember something, and turned to his mother. "Do you remember anything about a ghost with that incident?"

"Yes, of course, though the details of that situation were never fully revealed," Charlotte replied. "After the marowak was killed, Team Rocket stayed for a while to look for her children. Mr. Fuji tried to confront the poachers, to calm the spirit of the mother, as well as to help the cubone children. Then he was taken hostage, and it wasn't until a trainer that was passing through looked into things that everything was settled. If you want to know exactly what that trainer did, you'd have to talk to Mr. Fuji."

"He's still alive?" Evan asked. "No offense, but he seemed extremely old ten years ago."

"He's actually doing quite well," Charlotte assured. "And I'm sure he'd be more than willing to help you with your investigation, if you're soothing the souls of deceased pokemon."

Evan agreed. "I'll definitely have to talk to him sometime soon. Anyway, that's about the biggest thing that's happened with Pokemon Tower since I've been alive, though there have been other incidents of poaching." Evan seemed to have finished, and started getting up from the table. Jenna stood up, too, ready to head back to the Pokemon Center for a good night's rest.

"Oh, wait. Evan, you're forgetting that incident from about four years ago. Didn't you ever hear about it?" his mother asked.

Evan sat down again, and Jenna reluctantly followed suit. As interesting as the tale of Pokemon Tower had been, she was ready to go to bed. "I never heard about anything," Evan said. "What happened?"

"It was terrible," Charlotte said. "I didn't sleep well for weeks afterwards. It was Team Rocket trying to poach again, but this time, it was a group even worse than the first." Charlotte went on to explain that at first, they had no luck, though they knew for a fact that a mother marowak and several of her children were living in the Pokemon Tower. Then the thugs heard that a local woman had a special connection with the marowak. Desperate for money, the Rockets kidnapped both the woman and her husband, and tortured them inside the tower to try to draw out the marowak. Eventually, they killed the husband, and still nothing happened. Then, when they went for the woman, the marowak finally showed herself. "Yet again, I don't know many of the details. But I do know that Team Rocket completely outnumbered the poor marowak; she was killed, as were all but one of her young ones." Tears welled up in Charlotte's eyes, as she continued, "Then they killed the woman, anyway. Ordered their arbok to suffocate her. The one cubone wasn't the only orphaned, when things were all said and done; the human couple had a young child, as well. Nobody went up to the tower much in those days, so it wasn't until days after the kidnapping that the police figured out where Team Rocket had held her. And by then, the damage had been done."

They all sat in silence for a while, after the tale was finished. Even Jenna, who had faced a lot of trials already in her own life, felt moved. Team Rocket... Jenna had heard about them before, but she'd never realized that they were this bad. Worse even than Team Galactic, in a sense.

Still, it was late, and Jenna knew that she needed to get back to the Pokemon Center soon. "I'll be leaving now," she said, in a subdued manner. "Evan, I'll meet you here in the morning, if that's all right." Evan nodded in response, still stunned by his mother's story.

"Are you sure you wouldn't like to stay here?" Charlotte asked. "We could offer you the couch; it pulls out into a full-length bed. It's already very late, you know. And even if this isn't a huge town, it still has its trouble after dark."

Jenna smiled encouragingly. "I'm sure I'll be fine." And with that, she walked out the door.

Charlotte looked at her son, somewhat pleadingly. "Wouldn't you please stop her, before she gets herself hurt? The gangs around here have been more of a problem in recent months."

A smile crept onto Evan's face, in spite of himself. "Did you hear about the almost-apocalypse over in Sinnoh?"

"Of course; I was worried sick about you the entire time," his mother responded.

"Jenna is the one who single-handedly stopped that," Evan said simply. "I think she can take care of herself."

* * *

I kinda wish these chapters were longer... I mean, that's not how I set up Spirits of the Past, and so I'm trying to stick with a similar format... But still... Short chapters just annoy me, in general. Some chapters I see barely deserve to be called chapters, the chapters of this story included. I'm not sure why I'm so picky about it...

Anyway, there's my random rant of the day. Still hope that you're enjoying the story! Sorry if I sort of restated well-known pokelore... But I had to set up for the next chapters. Plus, there was a lot of new myth, so I hope that sort of drowned out the restating-the-obvious part.


	4. Exploration

Disclaimer: I'd love to own pokemon, or a private jet. Or, better yet, I'd love to own pokemon_ and_ a private jet. Even better than that, I'd love to own a private jet with depictions of pokemon on the outside of it, as well as owning the pokemon brand. Sadly, I own none of these things, and I doubt I ever shall. :(

* * *

**Towering Retribution**

Part 4: Exploration

"So would you remind me what we're going to be doing, exactly?" Jenna asked as she and Evan walked towards the radio tower. Only now did Jenna really realize just how huge the building was, with the massive edifice towering high into the sky just above her heads. Sure, it wasn't as big as Jubilife TV station. But now that she knew the history behind the building, it seemed to take on a whole new presence.

"We'll just be scoping out the building today," Evan replied. "I want to see if either of us get any reactions to particular spots in the building. In a place this big, any major spirits would normally be confined to a certain area, rather than wander the entire building."

Jenna glanced back up at the building, unable to keep from thinking that this was going to be a _long _day if they were going to go through every floor. She sighed, but kept the thought to herself.

When they arrived, the director was waiting for them, this time in a smaller office on the first floor. "I'm glad to see you weren't scared off by the apparition yesterday. I trust that your arm is okay?"

"Yes, thanks for asking," Evan answered. He held up his arm for the director to see; it was covered in a wrapping of gauze bandaging, though, so this action didn't particularly provide any insight to the health of his arm. "As long as I keep it wrapped up, the doctors said I should be fine. It stings a little," he admitted, "But something so minor as that won't scare me away from a case. Did you get what I asked for?"

The director nodded, hastily grabbing a couple of items out of his briefcase. "Here are your passes; they'll let either of you get past the security in any part of the building. The guards know that you're coming, anyway, so there shouldn't be too much trouble in any case," he said as he handed them lanyards, with cards attatched. "They also act as master card keys for all the doors here. And here are the floor plans that you asked me for."

Evan accepted the sheets of paper from the director. After a couple seconds of flipping through pages, Evan looked back up at the director, his eyes questioning. "Surely this is a mistake; I don't remember there ever being a basement to this place when it was Pokemon Tower."

"It was quite the surprise to me, too, when I acquired the building," the director said. "We were just going to have some experts check the foundations of the building; when they started investigating, they found an entire floor beneath the first."

"What was in it?"

"I never went in there myself, at least before we remodeled it, so I can only say what others reported to me. But apparently, the walls and ceiling were elaborately decorated, though they had decayed much. Reportedly, those who went down there that day of the discovery also found a skeleton."

"What kind of skeleton?" Jenna asked, curious. "Human?"

"No. It was half buried, but apparently very large, whatever it was," the director replied. "Still, when we sent people down the next day to collect it, it was gone. In fact, nothing had even been dug up. We guessed that the ghost pokemon had been causing an illusion, since we hadn't been able to chase them out at that point in time. If it helps your investigation at all, though, then I might suggest you start there. From that incident onward, the large basement room has been the focus of much of the hauntings, by both ghost type pokemon and true spirits."

Evan rolled up the floor plans. "Well, thank you for mentioning that; I think we'll start there. If you'll excuse us, we'd like to get started right away."

The director wished the two the best of luck, and then they were off. They went back out to the lobby first, and then approached the guard that was standing in front of the stairs to the basement.

The guard seemed a bit surprised that anyone was actually bothering him on duty. "I'm sorry, but no one's allowed in here," he explained. "After that near-disaster with the Goldenrod Radio Tower in Johto, we've really stepped up security."

"We've been hired to investigate this building; we should have full access to the building," Evan replied, gesturing to the card that was hanging from the lanyard around his neck. "Speaking of which, I was wondering if you could tell me if you've seen anything out of the ordinary around here."

"Oh, if that's the case, then forget about that excuse I just told you," the Guard said, acknowledging the duo's status. "We're keepin' everyone out because of the ghosts. I've seen a couple of pokemon ghosts myself; a rattata scurried across my path and through a wall just yesterday, and I caught a persian scratching up the walls a couple days before that. Gives me the shivers just thinkin' about it."

"Did either of them bother you?"

The guard shook his head. "Nah, they just sorta looked at me and then disappeared. Though there have been some attacks, or so I've heard."

Evan thanked the man, then went down the stairs, with Jenna following close behind. When they opened the doors at the bottom of the stairs, they found themselves looking into a large room, now filled with all sorts of pipes and mechanics and other things necessary to keep the radio tower up and running. It was obviously not originally made for this purpose; though the machinery was spread out from one wall of the room to the other, it wasn't nearly as crammed as Jenna would have imagined. More noticeably, the walls rose rather far above them, revealing the room to be nearly as tall as a small gymnasium.

Almost as soon as they entered the room, Jenna felt the hairs on the back of her neck prickle. More out of instinct than through conscious thought, Jenna found herself summoning her sandslash, Sandy, from her pokeball.

"What are you doing?" Evan asked.

"Let's just say that my trainer instincts are tingling. Something about this place gives me the creeps, much more so than does the rest of this tower that we've seen." Sandy, too, seemed to agree; she was tense as she scanned the room, vigilantly looking about for an enemy.

Evan released his natu. It perched on his head, then chirped. "Well, I can't sense whatever you think is here, and nor can natu," Evan said. "True, I sense a higher concentration of spirits, but ghosts often congregate at the highest and lowest reaches of a building. And even if you are a channeler, you shouldn't be able to sense anything that I cannot."

Jenna shook her head, frustrated. "I don't care whether you can sense it or not; something's there, and I don't like it. If we're going to check out this basement, let's do it quickly."

"I'm certain you're just being paranoid. Still, unless we find something, I see no reason why we'd need to hang around down here."

Much to Jenna's relief, they didn't find anything, and so they didn't need to stay for very long. They were in and out of the basement in just under fifteen minutes. Every moment of those minutes felt like an eternity to Jenna, with each second grating heavily on her nerves. It didn't help that she could just imagine just how easily something could hide in the machinery, just waiting for the opportune moment to attack. She kept Sandy out until they left the basement, wanting to be ready for whatever she sensed.

"See? Nothing there," Evan said as they moved on to the first floor of the building. "Your channeler sense might just be overreacting, since you haven't been exposed to ghosts all that much."

"Yeah, well, so sue me." Jenna didn't much like being proven wrong. "Let's just keep our mind on the task at hand... for example, it might be helpful to keep a watch on that up ahead." Jenna pointed, and Evan turned his attention a ponyta ahead of them in the hallway, which he was sure hadn't been there a moment before.

The ponyta completely ignored Jenna, and it instead charged straight towards Evan. However, Jenna was ready this time. She quickly pulled a pokeball out of her satchel, calling out her golduck.

"Silver, use water pulse," she commanded, her eyes trained on the oncoming pokemon. The golduck complied, sending a roughly spherical shot of water directly towards the fiery horse. It hit dead-on, and the pokemon almost immediately disappeared; the only sign to indicate that anything had taken place was the pool of water left on the floor.

"Thanks, Silver," Jenna said as she recalled her pokemon. Then she turned to Evan. "These pokemon ghosts certainly seem to have something against you, don't they?"

Evan tried to recover his wits. "Yeah, I suppose so. It probably has something to do with my power as a psychic. Spirits can sense the power, and it can often either anger or scare them."

Jenna felt a bit more satisfied after that incident; it was about the only useful thing she'd been able to do yet. As they progressed through the tower, a couple more pokemon phantasms were seen, and only one other attacked Evan; Jenna easily dispatched it before it could do any damage. Other than these phantoms, hardly anything else wandered the hallways. The place was entirely void of human occupation. With all of the ghosts wandering around, Jenna could hardly blame people for not wanting to stick around.

As the hours passed and they wandered the hallways, Jenna felt that the search was turning up fruitless. Evan found nothing of interest to him, besides the obviously large number of strong spirits wandering around. Perhaps this was a good thing. It meant that maybe it wouldn't be too hard to exorcise the place, or so Jenna thought. Despite this idea, though, Jenna found her mood slipping downhill as the day continued. Even when she managed to save Evan from the second pokemon that attacked him, she felt useless. Unneeded. Ineffective.

And if that wasn't enough, she found herself rapidly tiring. Every step felt like she was carrying a pair of bonsly on her feet, and her ears kept on ringing. Several times, she turned around at the sound of whispers, but saw nothing. It was as if the entire dark atmosphere of the place was focusing its malignancy on Jenna.

It was once she started getting dizzy that she knew that something was wrong. "Evan," she said quietly. He didn't hear her at first, so she repeated herself, more audibly.

"What?" he asked, turning around. Before Jenna could answer, he took a closer look at her. "You look pale. Are you alright?"

Jenna shook her head. The dizziness was getting worse, and she slowly slid to the floor to prevent herself from toppling over. "Something's wrong with me. I've been slowly wearing out all day, and I'm really dizzy," She half-mumbled, unable to think straight. She had pulled her knees up against her torso, and now she put her head in between her knees. That seemed to help slightly, and she muttered, "I think it's the ghost of the butler. He's trying to get back into my head."

Evan's expression darkened. "I didn't think about that. We need to get you out of this building, if that's the case. Immediately. Come on." He tried grabbing her arm, but as soon as Jenna raised her head, the dizziness returned.

"I can't walk like this," she murmured, panic slowly overtaking her. Though she normally remained unfazed by any threat, this was different; there was nothing she could do to fight a ghost within her own body.

Evan opened his own bag, shuffling around among his supplies for his pokeballs. "Not good, not good," he said to himself, until he managed to pull out two pokeballs. He summoned his two chimecho, and ordered the two of them to use heal bell. As the gentle chiming suffused the air, Jenna felt energy fill her body, and the dizziness faded away.

"Let's go now," Evan said hurriedly, practically pulling her up from the ground. She was still weak, so he put her arm around his shoulder, supporting her as much as he could. Despite the situation, Jenna felt herself blush, out of both shame for her weakness and her proximity to Evan. They headed quickly to the elevator, which were thankfully still operational in spite of its weeks of dormancy. When the doors opened into the lobby, though, Jenna refused to let Evan continue to carry her weight. Her pride simply would not allow it. She managed to walk from the elevator, through the lobby, and out the doors by herself, albeit a little shakily.

Almost as soon as she made it out into the sunshine, Jenna collapsed onto the ground, partly out of exhaustion and partly from relief. She felt a million times better, now that she was out of that tower. In fact, aside from her bodily weakness, she felt better than she had in a long time. More specifically, better than she had for nearly two years.

"Are you feeling okay now, Jenna?" Evan asked, his eyes both concerned and afraid. "Is the ghost still trying to invade your mind? I could try doing an exorcism, though it might not help. I'm sorry I didn't sense the ghost myself; there were just so many other ghosts in there, that..." Something about Jenna's almost awestruck face made Evan trail off mid-sentence.

"You know," the teenage girl said, looking off into the distance, "Until you told me the other day, I hadn't even known that the butler ghost was still following me. Now, I'm not sure how I possibly could have ignored it." She looked up at Evan, a slight smile tugging at the corners of her mouth.

"He's gone," she continued, in a whisper. "The butler's presence is completely gone, I think. I feel so much better than I have for months and months. The funny thing is, I didn't even know I had been feeling bad until now."

Evan looked at Jenna dumbly for a moment, then lowered himself onto the grass next to her. "That's great," he said after a while. "And it reveals a lot about the tower itself."

"Like what?"

"The place gives spirits power," Evan answered. "That's how your ghost got so strong, so quickly. Of course, I already knew that from the spirits that attacked us. More importantly, something about the tower draws spirits to it, and keeps them there. Now if I only knew why they were attacking people, we might have a better idea as to how to go about this investigation."

Jenna frowned. "Don't you think the pokemon are just angry that the tower has been disturbed?"

"That could be, but something seems too simple about that theory for it to be correct. Plus, even under those circumstances, pokemon spirits are very rarely violent towards the living. In those rare cases that they exhibit hostility, it's because the spirit is angry or confused or sad, and yet I detected no emotions from the apparitions we encountered."

"Really? They certainly seemed angry to me," Jenna commented.

"No, they weren't. At least, not particularly. I would have sensed it," Evan insisted. The two sat for a while like that, side by side in the grass in front of the tower. It was a very nice day, making it all too easy for the two to get lost in their own thoughts. After the past forty-eight hours or so, they both appreciated having a moment without the fear of some ghost or another attacking. To anyone passing by, they probably looked like a young couple, enjoying each other's company in the bright sunshine of a gorgeous afternoon.

"Well, at least I know what our next step will be," Evan said after a while, breaking the silence. "Tomorrow, we'll have to go pay our regards to old man Fuji."

* * *

Before I say anything else, I want to give my hearty thanks to Redemmo for some great suggestions on how to improve this story! It really has helped a lot, and I've done a good bit of editing to the previous three chapter based on Redemmo's critiquing. So thanks once again!

Also, since I can't really think of anything to say about the story itself at the point, I'd like to encourage anyone who reads this to review! Even if it's just to tell me that you think the story stinks and that I need to get a life, go ahead and review. Although if you're just being mean to be mean, I'll probably just laugh at your comment. I appreciate all the constructive criticism I can possibly get! And if you've written a story here on , you probably know just how nice it is to hear that people like you story. (Hearing the dislike is, admittedly, not as fun, though as long as it includes reasoning behind it, I still like to hear it~)


	5. Hope or Despair?

Disclaimer: I don't own Tsutaja, Pokabu, or Mijumaru, or any other pokemon, for that matter. Though you can bet that when Black and White come out, Pokabu will be mine! Or maybe Tsutaja. Not Mijumaru, though, because even though he's supposed to be an otter, I've still got friends that think he's a beaver-duck-cat. And I don't like beaver-duck-cats.

* * *

**Towering Retribution**

Part Five: Hope or Despair?

"Hello, Mr. Fuji," Evan said, smiling like he was greeting an old friend. In fact, he _was _greeting an old friend, in two senses of the phrase: he was greeting someone that he hadn't seen in a long time and who was, indeed, very old. Jenna didn't think that she'd ever seen anyone older, as a matter of fact. Nor had she been in many places weirder than the building she was in now. It was almost like a church, but with rows and rows of gravestones instead of pews. It came in at second in the list of creepiest places she'd ever been to, with only the Old Chateau ahead of it.

The old man shook Evan's hand as he squinted at his face. "Welcome to the Pokemon Memorial Building. I'm terribly sorry, but have we met before? My eyes aren't what they used to be."

"It's probably not your eyes. I've changed a lot since the last time you saw me. Remember the boy you gave the abandoned girafarig to?"

Mr. Fuji's previously courteous smile turned into one of more hearty welcome. "Evan Farlowe! I haven't seen you around town in years! What have you been doing with yourself? And how's that girafarig doing?"

"She's fine, thank you. The girafarig, that is. And as for what I've been doing with myself, that's actually why I'm here. I've developed my psychic abilities and started a bit of a paranormal investigation business. Right now, I'm looking into the hauntings at the radio tower. I presume you've heard about them?"

Fuji's eyebrows knitted together in a scowl. "Yes, yes, I've heard about them. Nasty business. Though I can't say I blame those poor spirits. Turning that tower into a radio corporation was nothing short of desecration."

"I can't say I disagree," Evan said. He was about to start another question, but Jenna was starting to feel a bit left out of the conversation. Again. It seemed to be happening a lot since they had arrived at Lavender Town. She coughed a little bit to make herself known.

"Oh? And who would you be? Young Mr. Farlowe's girlfriend, perhaps?" Mr. Fuji asked, a mischievous glint in his eye. Then, seeing the two of them blush, he added, "Now, now, only joking, youngsters."

"My name's Jenna," she replied as soon as she had recovered from her slight embarrassment, giving a courteous nod of the head to Mr. Fuji.

Fuji's eyes widened behind his spectacles. "You wouldn't happen to be... Could you possibly be... _The_ Jenna from Sinnoh? The one who stopped the plans of that wicked Team Galactic? Your face does look very familiar."

Jena puffed up a little, her pride readily inflating. "That would be me. Nice to meet you."

"No, no, the pleasure is all mine," Mr. Fuji said as he shook Jenna's hand vigorously. "It was splendid of you to take on such a cruel organization single-handedly. I commend you for your efforts. It makes me wish all the more fervently that I could have done something more for these poor pokemon." He gestured to the graves around him.

"Speaking of which, could you answer a couple of my questions about the place that used to be Pokemon Tower?" Even interrupted. "Specifically, I'd like to know more about the Team Rocket incidents, both twelve years ago and four years ago." Evan then went on to explain what he knew from the conversation with his mother the other night.

Mr. Fuji's face darkened once again. "As far as the first incident goes, there's not much else I can tell you. The Rockets killed the mother marowak, but not the children, and they later took me hostage. A trainer that was passing through town heard about the trouble, and decided to help. He defeated and calmed the spirit of the mother marowak, then forced Team Rocket away. A remarkable trainer, he was."

"The incident from four years ago was much sadder. As you mentioned, that young couple was used to draw out the marowak; eventually, the couple, the mother marowak, and all but one of her younglings were murdered."

"Could you maybe tell us more about the couple? Who were they? Would I have known them?" Evan asked.

Fuji shook his head. "I doubt it. They moved into town about a year after you left, I think, and a year and a half or so before the tragedy occurred. The wife came from Fiore, which is what made her so unique. You do know about Fiore, right?"

"It's one of those weird regions that forbids pokeballs, right?" Jenna said.

"Yes, indeed, though I wouldn't call it weird," Fuji replied. "There, they are more in harmony with pokemon. They believe in 'partnering' with pokemon, but it is a much more mutual agreement, without anything so binding as a pokeball. Both parents were very involved with my efforts to help abandoned pokemon. The wife, Alice, managed to 'partner' with the marowak of the tower, albeit on a very loose basis. That is to say, they stayed in their separate spheres of life for the most part, though Alice did her best to check in on the marowak as often as possible. And therein did the tragedy blossom. I believe you already mentioned the other details of the story."

"Didn't the couple have a daughter? What happened to her?"

A strange look came into Fuji's eye, as if this part of the story hit closer to his heart. He even smiled a bit, though his expression seemed bittersweet. "Hope - that's the girl's name, ironically enough - she was five when her parents were murdered. For the last four years, I've been taking care of her."

"But I thought you only looked after abandoned pokemon, not humans," Evan said.

"You misunderstand," Fuji said. "She's actually a relative of mine. A grand-niece, so to speak. My brother was her grandfather on the girl's father's side of the family."

Evan seemed somewhat glad to hear this; it saved him the trouble of seeking out Hope's caretakers, after all. "Is there any chance we might talk to her? Unless you think it might bring back bad memories, in which case we won't bother her."

Mr. Fuji hesitated. "Hope is... a unique child. She doesn't seem to mind talking about the incident, and she remembers it quite well, despite the fact that she was only five at the time. Your welcome to talk to her, if you can find her."

"If we can find her?" Jenna repeated, confused.

"Yes. Ever since her parents' death four years ago, she goes out and trains nearly everyday with the cubone that was also orphaned by Team Rocket. She's normally up north of town, where the terrain starts to get rocky."

"Wait a minute... You let her go there by herself?" Jenna asked, rather appalled. "What kind of guardian are you?"

Fuji looked down at the ground. "Not a very good one, I'm afraid. Since she and that cubone got together, I don't think she would be satisfied doing anything else. Even when she was only five years old, that's all they would do in my backyard. I've tried encouraging other activities, but..."

Evan laid his hand on the old man's shoulder. "Mr. Fuji, we understand. It was probably very hard for her, after her mother and father both died in such a terrible manner. Perhaps training is how she deals with it. Anyway, we'll be off; thanks for all of your help."

::::::::::::::::::::

Evan and Jenna searched the area north of town for nearly an hour before Jenna got frustrated enough to bring her charizard, Flame, out for the search. Once in the air, it wasn't difficult for Flame to find the little girl, since she was probably one of the only humans training in the area. Within ten minutes, the charizard was back. After another twenty minutes, Evan and Jenna had arrived at Hope's training grounds.

"Well, that's gotta be her," Jenna said as they approached, though they were still far enough away that it was hard to see the girl well. Jenna watched as the girl and another figure - probably the cubone - approached each other, then seemed to jump away. This repeated several times until Jenna was thoroughly puzzled as to what was going on. "What are they doing? Looks more like they're dancing or playing, rather than training like old man Fuji said."

Evan squinted. Then, without warning, he started running towards the girl.

"Evan! What are you doing?" Jenna said as she ran after him.

"That pokemon is attacking the girl! We've got to stop it, before she's hurt!"

Jenna easily caught up and grabbed Evan's arm, forcing him to stop. "Woah, woah. Slow down there and think about things for a second. Fuji said that Hope was training out here with her cubone, right?"

"But she's going to be hurt," Evan said, yanking his arm out of Jenna's grasp. "No trainer in his right mind would order a pokemon to attack him."

"You'd be surprised. I've still got scars from when my sandslash was a sandshrew." Evan just gaped at the statement. Jenna, feeling she had to justify herself, continued, "Well, what did you expect? Sure, most trainers don't resort to such methods. But what's the point of sending a pokemon into battle when you can't face a little pain yourself?"

"But she's just a little girl! Surely we can't just let her hurt herself like this!"

"Mister," a voice said from behind Evan. "If you don't like watching us train, we'll wait until you're gone to continue." Evan jumped slightly. Both he and Jenna had been too intent on their argument to notice the little girl and her cubone approach.

Jenna turned toward the girl and sat down, folding her legs in front of her. "Don't mind him; he's got pokemon of his own, but he's not much of a trainer. I was doing the same thing with my own pokemon when I was your age. She was a ground-type pokemon, just like your cubone. Want to meet her?"

"If you want me to," the girl said solemnly. There wasn't an ounce of happiness on the child's face, nor the least bit of sadness. If anything, it seemed to Jenna as if the child was rather emotionless.

"I do want you to meet her, as a matter of fact." Jenna reached into her bag and released a sandslash from a pokeball. The ground-type looked at the girl and her cubone curiously. "This is Sandy. And I'm Jenna, by the way. You wouldn't happen to be Hope by any chance, would you?"

The child stepped forward to pat Sandy on the forehead. Only now did Jenna see just how filthy the girl was; it looked as if she'd been training out here for hours. Even most grown trainers weren't that committed. "Yeah, my name's Hope. And this is my cubone. Why are you guys here?"

"We were wondering if you might tell us something about your parents, and what used to be Pokemon Tower," Evan said before Jenna could stop him.

"That is, if you want to talk about it," Jenna said, throwing a glare up at Evan. While by no means was Jenna the most kind-hearted person in the world, it still amazed her how thick guys could be. You don't just burst into conversation with a little girl about her dead parents.

Hope started scratching the base of one of Sandy's ears. Without looking up from what she was doing, she said, "It's okay. It doesn't bother me. What did you want to know?"

Evan, who had been standing up until now, finally had the sense to sit down so that he could talk with Hope at eye-level. Even so, she didn't look up, but that didn't discourage Evan. "Well, the first thing I want to know... Were your parents the kind of people to hold a grudge against someone who hurts pokemon? Would they have been resentful about being used and killed to lure out your cubone's mother?"

Before responding, Hope glanced over at her cubone. It was facing away from the group, staring off in the direction of Lavender Town. More specifically, it was staring at the spot in the sky where the Radio Tower could be seen. "Cubone, do you want to go play with Sandy while we talk?" Hope asked, not bothering to ask Jenna's permission. The cubone thumped its tail on the ground, but otherwise didn't make a move.

Hope seemed to accept this as an answer, because she went back to petting Sandy's head. "My mom and dad hated people that hurt pokemon," Hope said in answer to Evan's question, though she still didn't look up. "And my mom was really sad when Marowak finally showed herself on that day she was kept in the tower."

"How do you know that?" Jenna asked.

"Cubone told me."

Jenna smiled a little bit. A lot of little kids thought that they could communicate with pokemon. "Oh? So you can talk with pokemon?"

"No. But we were both sad when our parents died, and he told me what he saw through that."

This didn't sound like a little kid's wishful imaginings. "Told you through what, exactly?" Jenna asked.

"The sadness."

Evan and Jenna exchanged equal looks of puzzlement. It couldn't be possible, and yet the way Hope said it made it seem like she stating something obvious, like the color of the sky.

"But would your parents have actually held a grudge?" Evan asked once again.

Hope finally looked up, right into Evan's eyes. "They might have. I'm not sure."

Evan let out his breath. This wasn't exactly the certain response he had been hoping for. "Well, I've got one other thing to ask of you, then. How would you like to come back with us to the Radio Tower and help us with something, before we take you home to Fuji?"

Jenna looked over at Evan once again, this time with suspicion in her eyes. What was Evan doing? They hadn't talked about anything like this on their way to find Hope. Was he trying to drag a little girl into that tower full of ghosts?

Hope pulled a pokeball out of her pocket and recalled her cubone. "It doesn't matter to me," she said, her face as impassive as ever. "If you need me to help, I can help, I guess."

:::::::::::::::::::::

"There's no way in hell that I'd agree to that plan," Jenna said. Evan had waited until they had arrived in a solitary room in the upper reaches of the Radio Tower to reveal what he was doing. And Jenna didn't like one bit of it. "It's cruel to me, and cruel to Hope. That's all there is to it."

"Really, I don't mind," Hope replied very convincingly. She didn't seem to mind anything.

"You see?" Evan answered as he set up candles around a table in the center of the room. "It's just you that's holding us up. Trust me, channeling is nothing like true possession. It won't be a repeat of the whole "Old Chateau" business. Plus, maybe I'm wrong, and you're not a channeler. In that case, nothing will even happen."

Jenna's cheeks were turning splotchy with anger. "So you want to use this girl as a trigger to summon her dead mother into my body? Do you want to traumatize her? What good is this supposed to do, anyway?"

"Hope says she'll be fine. And I have a good hunch that one or both of the girl's parents are commanding the ghosts here to attack, out of hatred for the desecration of Pokemon Tower. If I'm right, then we could have this whole mess solved by the time we're done with the séance. Or are you just too scared of ghosts to do what we're being paid to do?"

This was, of course, nonsense; she'd been using her pokemon to fight ghosts for half of yesterday. Yet the jibe stung Jenna's pride nonetheless. "Fine, you big bully. I'll go along with your little plan. But if I go on another possessed rampage, I hope to Arceus that you're the first to die."

Evan grimaced at the hatred in her voice, but as long as he had Jenna's cooperation, he didn't dare complain. "All right then, let's start."

Evan instructed Jenna and Hope to sit at one end of the long conference table, where he joined them after lighting the candles on the table, drawing the blinds, and shutting off the lights. Thin wisps of smoke rose from the tongues of candle flame, giving off an incense-like smell as they diffused throughout the room.

"Now everyone, I need you to join hands, close your eyes, and stay silent while I say the invocation." Hope did as he said, and Jenna grudgingly obliged as well. Jenna tried to act tough, but Evan could easily feel her arms trembling. He started to regret goading her into helping, since it caused her this much alarm. But there was no help for it now. They had to at least try it.

Evan slowed his breathing, then said into the air, "Spirits that reside within this building, listen well. Here I have a child named Hope, who has deep connections to this place. Here I have a channeller to let you speak what you have to say. Would any spirit connected to this child Hope please come forth and reveal yourself."

The candles sputtered, then suddenly flared. Jenna's hands stopped shaking, and Evan knew that the invocation was a success. He opened his eyes and looked at Jenna, who was now staring intently across the table at Hope. Hope, too, had opened her eyes, and was matching Jenna's gaze.

"Spirit, who are you? Are you the mother of this girl?" Evan asked.

Jenna shook her head.

"Are you the father, then?"

Again, Jenna shook her head.

Evan scowled. "Who are you? Will you speak your name?"

Jenna's mouth didn't open, and no response was attempted. She just kept on staring at Hope.

"Oh," Hope said, as if just understanding something. "You're my cubone's mother?"

Jenna nodded, with ever so slight a smile showing on her face.

Evan's scowl deepened. Channeling pokemon was out of the ordinary, though not unheard of. But even if this was an unexpected turn of events, he was determined to make the best of it. "Are you and other pokemon being controlled by something or someone to attack people?"

Jenna nodded.

"Who or what is it? Can you communicate your answer somehow?"

The candles flared even higher, and Jenna – or, technically, the marowak – slipped her hands out of Hope's and Evan's respective grasps. She pushed back her chair and tried to stand. Then all the energy seemed to leave her in an instant, and she crumpled to the floor. Though not completely unconscious, Jenna was obviously dazed as she slowly tried to push herself up from the floor.

Before Evan could get up to help his semi-conscious friend, a pokemon appeared on the table. It was only a couple feet tall, yet it had a truly fearsome appearance. It's tough brown and almost dinosaur-like hide made it seem prehistoric, and the bone held in its hand looked like a formidable weapon. The most frightening facet to its appearance, though, was the skull-like head, bleached white as if it had been left in the sun for far too long.

Evan braced himself; he was sure that this mother marowak was going to attack him, like every other pokemon they had encountered in the tower so far. However, she leapt with incredible agility not towards him, but towards the dazed figure that she had been possessing just a few moments ago.

Using the momentum of the jump to increase her force, the marowak brought down her bone-weapon right into Jenna's torso. Evan heard the sickening snap of cracking ribs, and Jenna fell back down onto her back, gasping with pain. The marowak raised her bone once again, this time aiming for Jenna's head. Part of Evan's brain knew he had to help Jenna before she was killed, but his body didn't want to respond quickly enough.

"Cubone, tackle the ghost." Before Evan could quite comprehend what was happening, Hope's cubone was attacking the ghost of its mother. The marowak vanished before it could deal its decisive blow to Jenna's head.

The cubone hopped back onto the table and faced its trainer, its eyes sorrowful.

"Yes," Hope said, her uncaring mask dropping for a second as true sorrow showed in her eyes. "That was your mother."

The cubone stared at her, then rushed into her arms. She grabbed him and held him tightly as his tears dripped out of the hollow skull covering his head.

"You see what you've done now?" Jenna muttered under her breath.

Evan finally snapped out of his surprise and looked back over to Jenna. She was fully conscious now, and she'd managed to push herself off the ground and lean her body against the wall.

"Jenna! You shouldn't be standing. Here." He grabbed a chair and brought it over to her. She cautiously sat down, being careful not to bend her upper body too much. Jenna looked up at Evan, a bitter smile on her face.

Evan immediately hated himself. Looking down at her, he realized just how young she was. Only sixteen, for crying out loud! How could he involve her in something like this? Just because of some stupid feeling that she needed to be here?

"Do you see what you've done now?" Jenna repeated, the expression on her face now almost satisfied. "Look around you. You've traumatized a poor little cubone, somehow – the details are a bit fuzzy to me - and now I've got a couple of ribs to try and heal. I'm quite curious how they got hit, by the way. I didn't see what did it. Though you can bet I felt the whack. Anyway, way to go. I hate to say 'I told you so', but I really did tell you that this wasn't a good idea."

::::::::::::::::::

The sun was dipping down close to the horizon when Evan and Jenna walked away from Mr. Fuji's house, after dropping Hope off and telling her caretaker what had occurred.

"Are you certain I can't convince you to go to the hospital? That bone attack sounded pretty wicked." Evan said.

"It was a pretty wicked attack, but no, I don't want to mess with that," Jenna assured him. "I've dealt with worse before and lived. A couple broken ribs is nothing to fuss about. Plus, you saw that I had my golduck checking out the damage with his psychic powers. He wasn't worried, and so neither am I. I'll just need to take it relatively easy while the bones heal."

Evan sighed, resigning himself to the fact that Jenna was too prideful for her own good sometimes. "So how do you intend to keep on helping with the investigation? You know, if you want to, you can back out. Considering the circumstances, I wouldn't mind."

Jenna laughed. Pain lanced up her side, but she ignored it. "You're much too incompetent with fast action for me to let you go in there alone. Personally, I'm surprised that you haven't gotten yourself killed hunting ghosts in the two years since I first met you."

Evan smiled. "And you seem so reckless that it surprises me that you can even sleep without getting yourself into some kind of trouble. By the way, don't you find it ironic that just two nights ago, _you_ were the one walking _me _home due to ghost pokemon attack? Now it's the other way around."

Jenna blushed and hit him playfully. "And who's fault is it that the marowak was summoned and I couldn't react? That would be yours, Mr. High-and-Mighty Psychic.

They continued to joke like this as Evan walked Jenna to the Pokemon Center. Despite the fact that she did blame Evan for the incident today, Jenna felt no ill feelings towards him. Up until now, she'd missed the excitement of doing something really risky. Even two or three broken ribs were worth it, to feel that exhilaration again.

But despite all her joking on the way to the Pokemon Center, Jenna was exhausted. As soon as Evan had dropped her off and left, she felt ready to crawl into bed and sleep.

Yet even when she was this tired, she didn't let her duties as a pokemon trainer slide. She took her pokemon outside the center and fed them (pokemon like her charizard were too large to be let out inside the center), and made sure they were all feeling okay. Some were a little antsy to be let out of their respective pokeballs more, but Jenna knew they could deal with it for at least a couple more days.

Then she got herself ready for the evening – brushing her hair, plugging in her cell phone to charge overnight, etcetera. By the time she finally flung herself down on the bed in her room (hurting her ribs again in the process), it was barely 8:30. Quite early to be going to bed, but Jenna was tired enough not to care.

All in all, it had been a relatively normal evening. Treating the Pokemon Center like home, caring for her pokemon, going to bed in a room so tiny that Jenna probably could have stood in the center of the room and touched all four walls if she stretched. The excitement of the day was great, but this familiarity also had an appeal of its own. And with that thought in mind, she fell asleep.

:::::::::::::::::::

Jenna wasn't sure what time it was when a fit of coughing woke her, causing pain to branch out from her bruised and broken side. Everything smelled of smoke. Thick, choking, killing smoke. The bedside table next to her and the wall around it was engulfed in flames, and the tiny room was quickly filling up with black fumes.

_Good Arceus, give me a break! First a ghost marowak tries to club out my brains, and now this?_

* * *

Sorry it took so long to get this chapter out... I've been planning the story I'll be writing after this one, and so I've been much more focused on that than this. In fact, this story is a bit of a prologue to the other story, which will be closer in length to my Shugo Chara fanfic. At least that's something to look forward to. Good news is, I have less than a week of school left... Once that's done, I have more free time! Yay!

Thanks so much to Redemmo and Farla for being my only reviewers so far! I appreciate all the input. A lot. Arceus knows that I need it.

On that note, I appreciate all reviews (as long as they are constructive, or at least not mean), so please review! It brightens my day considerably~~! Thanks for reading!


	6. Out of the Fire, Into the Water

Disclaimer: I own neither Reshiram nor Zekrom (the two new legendaries that were revealed today), nor any other part of the pokemon franchise. Though that would be awesome, to have those two legends under my control. However, I'm glad I'm not the head of the logic division of pokemon right now. Because who the frick makes Reshiram (a white pokemon) the cover character of black version, while Zekrom (a black pokemon) gets white version? IT MAKES NO SENSE!

* * *

**Towering Retribution**

Part Six: Out of the Fire, Into the Water

Jenna stumbled out of bed and onto the floor, instinctually grabbing her bag. Even if it was awkward to carry as long as she had some broken ribs, it held all of her most important stuff. This 'stuff' included her pokemon, and there was no way she was going to let them burn to ashes.

From her new position on the floor, she quickly assessed her situation. Most importantly, she realized that she didn't have a lot of time. The room was so small that the smoke filling it could probably kill her in the next couple of minutes. Jenna was surprised she wasn't dead yet. Before she could continue planing, she started coughing again, harder than before, causing pain to lance through her side and making her lose precious time. As she recovered, she quickly turned towards the door. Maybe the window wasn't an escape option, but the fire was on the opposite wall from the entrance of the room. Despite the overall heat of the room, she doubted that the doorknob would be too hot to handle.

Staying as low to the ground as possible and coughing all the while, Jenna reached up and grasped the doorknob. She turned her hand, but the sweat on her palms gave her next to no grip. She frantically wiped her hand off on her pajama pants and tried again. It turned this time, but the door refused to open.

_Oh, right. The deadbolt._

She moved her hands up higher and fumbled with the lock, but it wouldn't budge no matter how much she tried to turn it.

"Good Arceus, even the door is trying to kill me," Jenna cursed under her breath, making her cough more. Whether from the pain in her side or the lack of oxygen, the new round of coughing made her head swim. Frantically, she reached into her bag to grab a pokeball. Three of her pokemon - a tyranitar, a charizard, and a nidoqueen - could easily smash through the burning wall and get Jenna to freedom, but all three were so large that any one of them couldn't possibly fit in the room well enough to move without crushing its trainer. Ninetails could withstand the fire, and her psychic might get something done... but yet again, she had enough length to her body that she probably wouldn't fit. Golduck might be able to put out the fire, but bringing him out of his pokeball would force one either himself or his trainer much too close to the inflamed wall for comfort. So there was only one option.

"Sandy, come out and do something about that door!" The sandslash immediately saw the problem upon coming out of its pokeball, and attacked the door with such a slash that it would have made a scyther proud. Sandy's sharp claws easily cut through the door, shattering much of it. After a couple more slashes, there was enough room for Jenna to crawl out without stabbing herself on the splinters. Jenna was glad when Sandy finished quickly; having Sandy attack the door meant that she had to move closer to the fire. She could practically feel the hair on the back of her head wanting to burn as she dashed through the hole in the door after Sandy.

Jenna hit the ground outside of the room hard as she collapsed into another fit of coughing. Sandy nudged her as she wheezed and choked, concerned about her trainer yet clueless about what she could do to help.

Smoke now spilled out into the hallway, and soon the air was filled with loud, annoying beeping of fire alarms. Rooms up and down the hall opened and bleary-eyed trainers of all ages slowly began to file into the hallway. Most of them acted only inconvenienced. At least, they did until they saw that smoke was already darkening the hallway. Then they hurried out of there almost as quickly as if they were being chased by a pack of houndoom.

Jenna didn't get a good look at the trainer who helped her up before she started coughing again. The man - he was certainly too tall and large to be a girl, from what Jenna _could_ tell - draped one of her arms over his shoulders and practically carried her out of the pokemon center and into the cool night air. He set Jenna gently down on the ground, and laid her bag right next to her. Sandy, who had been following closely behind, was immediately back at Jenna's side.

"Thanks," Jenna managed to gasp out. She had finally managed to quit coughing, for the most part, though her lungs burned as if they were on fire. She looked up and saw that he was, indeed, a very large and gruff man, with dirty and worn look of an experienced hiker.

"Don't mention it. Just focus on breathing, for now. The ambulance and fire fighters ought to be getting here soon, so just hang tight until then."

Jenna took his words to heart. She was exhausted, and sore, and not thinking quite clearly enough for her liking. As if the lungs and throat weren't bad enough, Jenna's side was killing her. Vaguely, she wondered if one of the fractured ribs could have pierced her lung in the confusion; then again, if that had happened, she'd have been coughing up more than just smoke moments ago.

The firefighters arrived first, using their water pokemon to stop the fire before it could spread very far from its origin. Then the ambulance came. Never before had Jenna thought that she'd be so glad to see an oxygen mask.

::::::::::::

She must have dozed off sometime during the ambulance ride, because the next thing she knew, she was in the hospital. Her lungs, though still rather raw, felt much better than during the fire the night before. Mid-morning light was streaming in her window, indicating that she'd been asleep for at least several hours.

"Oh good, you're up," a nurse said cheerfully, entering the room. "By the way, that's some bad bruising on your rib cage, and we took some x-rays that indicate you have a couple of ribs with small fractures. Did you get that in the fire?"

"No," Jenna answered simply, not wanting to go into detail about how she actually had received the fractures. "Does anyone know what happened yet? Like, what caused the fire?"

"Last I heard, they were blaming an appliance malfunction. A Sinnoh kind of cell phone charger was plugged into the wall, and it sparked enough to start a fire in the wall."

Jenna winced. "Is it bad to put a cell phone charger from Sinnoh in Kanto outlets?"

"Can be," the nurse confirmed as she wrote down information from the monitors. "It normally doesn't cause a problem, but they aren't quite made to work with Kanto outlets. Just slight differences, so it normally is okay. But stuff like this does happen occasionally."

Jenna let this sink in for a moment. That meant the fire was _her _fault. Trying to justify herself, she quickly went back through the rest of the disaster. "Well, could you explain to me why the door wouldn't unlock? Or why the fire detector in my room didn't do its job?"

The nurse shrugged. "The people who head up the pokemon center said that the locks sometimes stick - it's a fairly old pokemon center, after all - and that the heat might have warped it more than usual. As for the alarm, it must have been a malfunction, though they were insisting that they had tested all the fire detectors last month."

"Doesn't matter what they insist," Jenna pouted. "I still nearly died."

The nurse laughed. "Well, I've got to get to my next patient. Just focus on the 'nearly', not the 'died' part, and I think you'll see how lucky you are. As long as you take it easy for a while - for the sake of both your lungs and your ribs - then you're free to go. Make sure you sign out at the front desk."

Jenna did so and left, intending to go to the pokemon center to see if any of her other things could be recovered. The hospital had been holding her bag for her, so at least all her most important things were still with her. Thankfully, she had a change of clothes stashed among all the other junk in the bag, so she didn't have to go around in badly-singed clothing all day. It was hardly any different from her previous outfit: identical jeans, a similar tightly fitting t-shirt, and the same tennis shoes that she'd been wearing even before the fire.

Jenna had barely gone one block from the hospital when she heard someone shouting her name behind her. She stopped and turned to see Evan jogging to catch up.

"I was just heading to the hospital to see you," Evan said after he'd caught his breath. "I'm just glad I saw you heading down this way. Anyway, are you all right?"

"A couple broken ribs yesterday, a fire during the night... Of course I'm doing okay," Jenna said, smirking. "I'm getting kind of used to it. Wonder what I can do to get myself killed next? Hmm... Ever tried skydiving, Evan?"

Evan smiled. "Don't even joke about that. I'm not even letting you go back to the Radio Tower today," Jenna tried to protest, but he cut her off and continued, "Don't worry, I called up the president of the company. Considering the marowak thing yesterday and the fire during the night, he understands if we need to take a couple days off."

Jenna scowled. "But what am I supposed to do? Sit around all day and wait for ribs to heal?"

"While that would be ideal, I rather doubt you'd like to, though you're more than welcome to rest up at my parents' house." Jenna raised one eyebrow, making Evan laugh. "All right, all right!" Evan continued. "Seeing as that's not an option, why not see the sights? I was raised here, after all."

Jenna kept her eyebrow raised. "I thought that the radio tower was pretty much the only thing of notice in Lavender Town."

"_In_ it, yes. But the only thing of note in the area? No. How would you like to go see the boardwalks south of Lavender?"

::::::::::::::

Jenna thought it would be awkward, going to the boardwalk with a guy who had to be at least four years older than herself. Of course, neither of them tried to see the outing as a date. And yet... Going to the boardwalk with someone of the opposite gender just had that connotation with it. Almost everyone they passed was there with a date, with each couple at varying levels of closeness.

The afternoon did start out rather awkwardly. Neither Jenna nor Evan really knew what to talk about; they'd never really bothered to talk about non-paranormal stuff before. It wasn't until Jenna let out her golduck, Silver, for a swim that Jenna and Evan started laughing together. Jenna couldn't help but think that Silver had sensed the mood when she'd let him out of his pokeball, and so he'd gone out of his way to be entertaining. He'd jumped out of the water and used his psychic to send little waves onto the boardwalk and over their feet, soaking both Jenna's and Evan's shoes and socks. Most amusing was when Silver would surface right next to the couples that were being way too public about their affection; if they were too "busy" to notice him, then he'd water gun them both directly in their faces. That definitely did a lot to lighten the mood, if not between the targeted couples then at least between Jenna and Evan.

So then they got onto conversations about how annoying some couples could be (do they even REALIZE there are other people around?), and from there they went onto swapping stories and, eventually, talking about politics. This last topic was, surprisingly, the most engaging; though neither of them were terrible active in the political process, they both had strong views about the current goings-on in Sinnoh.

Eventually, however, they did make their way back to the topic of the paranormal.

"You know, about this whole thing with the Radio Tower... Since the fire this morning, I've been thinking..." Jenna started, not exactly sure how to say this gently.

"Yeah?" asked Evan.

Jenna took a deep breath. "Well, it seems like you really respect Mr. Fuji and all, but have you noticed that, since we talked to him, I've suddenly been having all the bad luck?"

Evan's eyebrows scrunched together. "What, you mean the fire? You think that Mr. Fuji set it or something? That's crazy; Mr. Fuji wouldn't hurt a soul."

"I'm not saying that he personally set the fire," Jenna said. "But when we went back to the Radio Tower yesterday, the marowak went straight for me. Up until then, all the ghosts had been targeting you. Plus, I'd charged my phone the night before last, and I never saw even the slightest spark. Yet last night, it was malfunctioning enough to start a fire. And how did I sleep through a fire starting and growing? I'm normally a light sleeper; I had a lot of enemies when I took on Team Galactic, and I got used to waking up if even the slightest thing was wrong. So why didn't I wake up until the coughing really got to me?"

"I'll admit that it's weird," Evan said. "But you think Mr. _Fuji_ did it?"

"Well, you've got to admit, he seems kind of pokemon-crazy. I mean, he takes care of all those pokemon _graves_, for crying out loud. He probably hates that the Pokemon Tower was turned into a commercial business. Plus, couldn't he maybe control the spirits of pokemon through their memorial markers? He's probably got hundreds of them."

"It's possible," Evan admitted. "But why attack you?"

Jenna shrugged. "You know this stuff better than I do. But I was thinking that maybe before we met with him, his spirits were automatically targeting whoever seemed the most dangerous. In this case, that was the person with the real psychic power: you. That makes sense, right?"

"Ghosts are automatically drawn to people with supernatureal powers. So if they were already targeting people, a lot of their focus would shift to me," Evan admitted.

"Okay, so that part of my theory works. But remember that Mr. Fuji recognized me? He knew that I'd destroyed Team Galactic, and beaten Palkia. Maybe once he knew I was involved, he saw me a greater threat than you, and so he started targeting me with the ghosts."

Evan shook his head. "I see your point... And you really do have a point there. The marowak did attack you specifically, and the fire could have easily been started by a ghost. But I just can't see Fuji hurting anyone, unless they were a direct threat to a living pokemon. And I don't think he could possibly feel justified in killing the person that calmed Palkia."

Jenna was about to respond, but what she liked to call her 'trainer instincts' started tingling. She turned around rapidly to look behind her, but saw nothing. Then, before she could look forward again, she tripped. Actually, it didn't particularly feel like a trip to her. Maybe she'd just lost her balance temporarily, after all the trauma her body had experienced over the last day. Either way, she found herself falling forward. She threw her hands out to catch herself, but she had just about reached one of the many turns in the extensive network of boardwalks. So instead of falling onto the worn wood planks, she found herself tumbling face first into the water.

She grabbed a quick breath before she hit the surface, and then water surrounded her. Jenna's clothes and bag weighed her down, which alone wouldn't have worried her; she was a strong swimmer, and Silver was somewhere nearby to help. But very quickly, Jenna realized something was wrong. She could feel something grabbing her legs, preventing her from kicking her way to the surface. She tried to open her eyes, but the saltiness of the water burned too much for her to keep her eyes open for long. But in the two or three seconds she managed it, she imagined that she could see a dark shadow in the water beneath her, with parts coiled around her legs.

_A tentacruel? _Jenna wondered as she closed her eyes again, focusing her efforts on pulling herself back to the surface. _But the water isn't so murky that I shouldn't be able to tell for sure. And I shouldn't be able to see my feet through a tentacruel's tentacles. _

Jenna dropped the bag she still had around her shoulder; she couldn't afford to keep it with her, if she went down and never came back up. Hopefully, it would float. Or else Silver could get it. Either way, the pokemon in their pokeballs would hopefully get away okay.

But after letting go of her bag, she found that she couldn't hold her breath any longer. Her lungs were still too weak. Jenna had barely been under the water for fifteen seconds, and yet she was already at her limit. Precious bubbles of air leaked out of her mouth, and it took all of her willpower to keep the rest of the already oxygen-drained air inside her lungs.

Then she felt arms around her. Pokemon arms, to be precise. Silver had finally made it. Though Jenna was losing strength fast, Silver was still bursting with energy. She felt him kicking powerfully beside her, his flippers making progress against the relentless downward pull. A moment later, Jenna felt their upward motion halt as the shadow's grasp tightened. In another moment, Jenna felt a burst of power rush past her, down towards the assailant. She knew that her golduck had either used a psybeam, or a water pulse, or maybe both at once.

Whatever it was, it worked. The grip loosened, and Silver managed to rip Jenna out of the binding tentacle of shadow. Jenna was gasping for air almost before her head was completely out of the water.

"Jenna!" Evan shouted from the boardwalk. "Here! Grab my hand!"

But before she could respond, she felt herself being lifted bodily from the water, through the air, and back onto the solid boards of the walkway. _Thanks Arceus that Silver knows how to think for himself... And that he has a good psychic attack. _Now her side was hurting again; she'd managed to ignore it to focus on the bigger problem of possible drowning, but now the pain came back with a vengeance from the exertion.

Silver jumped onto the boardwalk soon after, with Jenna's bag over his shoulder. He dropped it onto the boardwalk, then quickly turned to face the water again, his stance alert.

"Silver, is it still out there?" Jenna asked.

"Is what still out there?" Evan asked. Jenna ignored him as she hauled herself up from the ground, refusing to drop her guard until Silver had, too. But Silver seemed to think the trouble was over. He slowly forced himself to relax, and then turned back to his trainer.

Jenna sighed, then looked to Evan. "Did you sense anything supernatural just before I was tripped?"

"No. And what do you mean, you were tripped? You just took your eyes off of where you were going, and fell into the water. Were you attacked by something down there? This area is known for having some swarms of tentacool."

"I mean that I was tripped," Jenna said, annoyed. "And I meant what I said. Something tripped me, and if you didn't sense it, that means it wasn't a ghost. It had to be a pokemon. And whatever it was, it was way too big to be just a mischievous gengar having some fun. It's gotta be the thing that's trying to kill me."

Evan looked doubtful. "Are you sure your not just trying to make yourself look better? I mean, I don't care if you just tripped."

Jenna glared back at him with enough venom to make even an arbok stop in its tracks. "I'm not a klutz, and klutziness would not be able to keep me underwater for very long, especially with Silver helping. I know it was a pokemon. But I just don't know what."

She was going to continue, but then she felt her feet slowly lifting off of the ground. Jenna looked over to her golduck. "Yes? Do you know something?" Jenna's feet touched back down as Silver nodded his head and crossed his arms. "Okay, then what was that thing?"

In response, a pokeball zoomed out of Jenna's bag and into her hands.

"This is Sandy's pokeball. You're not saying this is her fault, are you?"

Silver shook his head.

Jenna frowned, frustrated. "Well, I don't know what you're trying to say, then. What does this pokemon have to do with Sandy?"

"Why don't you try communicating telepathically?" Evan suggested. "Even though you're a channeler and not a psychic, you ought to be able to get some idea what he's saying, if you have a good bond with him."

"Okay..." Jenna said. "So how do we-" She was cut off as Silver grabbed her arm and pulled her down into a sitting position. He sat down cross-legged in front of her and placed the central finger of his right hand onto Jenna's forehead.

"Now, it probably won't be as clear as words," Evan counseled. "Just try to let your mind wander, and what your golduck is trying to say should just-"

"Got it!" Jenna said, cutting Evan off. Facing her golduck, she said, "You could do this all the time, and you never filled me in? Telepathy could've saved us a lot of trouble in some situations."

Silver shrugged, then tilted his head towards Evan, indicating that Jenna should tell him what she had learned. Jenna shook her head and smiled; it was scary just how human Silver acted most of the time.

"All right, so the idea came to me almost as soon as Silver laid his finger on my forehead. That's how it's supposed to work, right?" Jenna asked Evan.

"Well, yes," Evan said. "Though I'm surprised that you picked up on his thoughts so quickly."

"I've had him for a long time; I can practically tell what he's thinking, even when he didn't use that telepathy thing you just told us to do," Jenna responded. Then, turning more serious, she said, "Do you remember when we were in the basement of the Radio Tower, and I felt creeped out while you couldn't have cared less?"

"Yeah."

"Well, the pokemon that's been trying to do me in is what I sensed in the basement. And this thing is crazy strong, if Silver is right in his guess. Silver must have just caught it off guard just now, when it tried to pull me under."

"How strong do you mean?" Evan asked.

Jenna scowled. "I mean, close to Palkia strong. That strong. I must admit, I really don't feel very safe when I'm on the hit list of something like that. _Especially_ when it can apparently turn invisible."

"But how does Silver even know about the basement?" Evan asked.

"He sensed it when I let him out further up in the building that same day. And he talked with Sandy later, when I fed all my pokemon at the center yesterday evening."

Evan looked at her, incredulity once again creeping into his gaze. "And you say this thing is as strong as Palkia? How can something like that be around and no one notice it?"

Jenna smiled, to Evan's disbelief; this wasn't exactly the most uplifting topic. "You know, after having dealings with the Spirits of the Lakes in Sinnoh, as well as one of Sinnoh's most revered deities, I've learned a couple of things about why legendary pokemon are legendary. One is that they're powerful enough to be remembered over the ages. Another is that they normally hide themselves well, hence the fact that they're considered legends. In this case... Well, maybe it just never showed itself enough to be remembered."

"Jenna, I think you need to come back to my house and rest. You've got to be going crazy. Even if this thing exists, you're smiling while you talk about a god pokemon that's got a death wish for you. Speaking of which, why does it suddenly want to kill you, and not me? Are you going to blame that on Mr. Fuji, too?"

"But Silver figured out that part, too," Jenna answered. "He noticed that the Butler's ghost was gone when I let him out of his pokeball later that day. He seems to think that this pokemon is able to draw the souls of the dead into itself, and control them. And since the Butler ghost knew about my dealings with legendaries, now the Radio Tower ghost does as well. And since finding that out, its seen me as a threat. If I can deal with one god then, logically, this pokemon must think I can deal with it, too. Because the pokemon we're dealing with isn't just powerful; it's a freaking God of the Dead. And the pokemon sees me as a defeater of gods."

Jenna was smiling again as she talked about this, and her expression literally scared Evan more than the words she was saying. "Maybe you're right," Evan relented, "But I'm still quite sure you might be losing your sanity, if not for the story then because you're smiling as you say it. Let's get you somewhere where you can rest, and then we can deal with this in the morning."

Jenna's smile only grew wider. "I probably am getting kind of crazy. I was at least half insane when I battled Palkia, anyway, so this probably isn't too different. But don't you get it? Maybe I didn't die in the fire, or in the water, but I probably won't even make it to tomorrow if I just sit back and rest. Besides, my pokemon have been itching for a battle."

"You don't mean..."

Jenna's smile filled her face even more, giving her eyes a deranged look. "You don't have to go with me, of course. You'll just get in the way, if I have to protect you. But I'm going back to that basement. Right. Now."

* * *

So I figured I should write this chapter before leaving on a week-long family vacation, and since I didn't have school today... here it is. I kept on writing in the first person from Jenna's perspective, for some reason, but I hopefully edited all of those instances out. Anyway, I'm excited about the new legends, even if their colors don't correspond with their games.

I'm also excited about getting to this point in the fic. Just 'cause Jenna's pretty much one of the most awesome characters I've ever created. And also because I love this particular fakemon. Note that I rarely use fakemon for fanfics, but it was necessary for this. I always said that turning Pokemon Tower into a radio tower was blasphemy, and now it really IS blasphemy, because now Pokemon Tower has its own god. So HA!

Actually, to be honest, I just want to get to my other fic. There will probably be one more chapter in this, then maybe an epilogue, and then I'm starting the new story. Which will make me happy~.

Please review! Because I'm getting the feeling that no one likes my story right now... Which is probably true, but it still makes me sad... Then again, I'm just going through this story so I can get to the next, so I can't exactly blame you... Oh well. Whatever.


	7. Battle

Disclaimer: I don't own pokemon. End of story. (Or is it?)

* * *

**Towering Retribution**

Part Seven: Battle

"So I've evacuated everyone from the building," Evan said as met up with Jenna, who was sitting with her back against the Radio Tower, "And with the help of the maintenance people, all of the unnecessary generators have been turned off. Only the electricity is still on, so that you'll be able to see where you're going."

Jenna looked off towards Lavender Town. The incessant drumming of her fingers against her leg was the only indication of anxiety. "No trouble?"

Evan shook his head, and handed Jenna a pokeball. "No. I didn't even need to use your sandslash. Were you attacked at all?"

A smile tugged at the corner of Jenna's mouth as she grasped the pokeball. "No, I was fine as well. Sounds like this pokemon knows I'm coming." She stood up, brushing nonexistent dirt off of her jeans.

"Are you sure you want to try this?" Evan asked. "When I talked with the director, he seemed open to abandoning the building all together. He doesn't want anyone's death to be under his command. It sounded like he'd much rather you wait so we can talk this out."

Jenna rolled her shoulders and popped her knuckles, seemingly unconcerned. "Yeah, he talked to me, too. But I'm not letting some pokemon bully me around." She made sure all her pokeballs were easily accessible in her bag, then looked up at Evan for the first time since he'd come outside. "I'm ready to go. Now, if I don't come back out in an hour or two, it means I'm either dead or badly wounded. Probably dead. Don't come in to get me unless you have a large group of people with you. It doesn't seem like Mr. God-of-Death in there likes attention very much, so you ought to be safe. And if that all does happen, then just abandon the tower altogether. I mean, let's be honest. If I can't defeat this thing, no one can. Got it?"

Evan hesitated. "Well… I still don't like it. Are you sure you don't want me to go in with you? I'll stay out of the way."

Jenna rolled her eyes as she started walking to the main entrance. "Everyone thinks they're staying out of the way. The truth is, _nothing_ is out of the way when my pokemon battle. Besides, I've got a good feeling that it's a ghost-type pokemon, in which case your pokemon would be next to useless. Just trust me, and stay here." As she finally reached the door and walked inside, she said, "If all goes well, then you're treating me to dinner after this. Just an FYI." And with that, the door closed behind her.

Almost immediately, her attitude changed. Her body trembled with anticipation. She could literally feel the pokemon's presence reverberating throughout the entire building. Any thought of her weak lungs and broken ribs faded away. She couldn't let petty distractions like weakness get in her way during a battle. Her mind was focused on only one thing: victory.

As she reached the top of the stairs to the basement, she called out two of her pokemon.

"Here's the initial plan," she said, looking at the two of them. Sandy and Silver were the two pokemon that had been in her possession for the longest amount of time. It seemed fitting that they would begin one of the biggest battles of Jenna's life. "Sandy, you'll be attacking. Do whatever you can to get near to the enemy." The ground pokemon nodded solemnly. Then Jenna looked up to her golduck. "Silver, I need you to detect the position of the creature. Under no circumstances do you allow yourself to get hit. A single ghost-type attack from this thing might be enough to knock you out. Understand?"

Both pokemon nodded in response.

Jenna smiled faintly. "Glad to battle next to you once again. Let's just do our best, and pray to Arceus that it's enough."

She stepped down the stairs, with her two pokemon following behind. But just as she was about to reach the bottom of the stairway, she heard a noise from above her. Jenna jumped and spun around, ready for an attack that wasn't coming. Because the source of the noise was not a pokemon, but a person at the top of the flight of stairs.

Evan.

"Even if you want me to stay outside, I won't," he said as he walked down the stairs towards her. "I'll stand in the stairway, outside of the actual basement, so I really shouldn't be in your way. I can't just stand outside the tower, wondering if you're dead or alive."

Jenna glowered. "When I battle, I can't guarantee that I'll remember you're there. What if an attack I order ends up hitting you, despite your claim that you'll be out of the way? Even if I remember you're there, I still might not hesitate to order an attack that might kill you. As long as it would give me a chance at victory, any action taken by me or my pokemon is possible. Are you really okay with that?"

Evan seemed shocked by the almost hateful tone in Jenna's voice. "But I know you wouldn't-"

"Do you?" Jenna interrupted. "In particularly tough battles, I've nearly killed people before. I've even ordered attacks that put my own life in danger. What do you _really_ know about me?"

Evan was silent.

"If that's the case – if you don't even know the person you're talking to - then leave and go with the original plan," Jenna said with a tone of finality. "I take this sort of thing seriously. If you want to watch a pokemon battle, then go to a gym or something."

She turned and jumped the final two steps, casting all thoughts of Evan from her mind. Whether Evan left or not was no longer any of her concern.

Then Jenna walked several feet into the basement, very foolishly leaving her entire self open to attack.

"Pokémon of this tower, if you really want to kill me, then now is the time!" Jenna shouted into the air, her voice ringing off of all pipes and machinery that normally powered the building. "But rather than doing so in your cowardly ways, I challenge you to defeat me in a battle! Do you dare accept my challenge?"

No response came immediately. Jenna and her pokemon waited tensely as one minute passed. Then as five minutes passed. Then ten. As time dragged by, Jenna went through strategies in her head, all the while keeping her eyes and ears open for danger.

After nearly fifteen minutes had passed, the slightest of sounds from Silver alerted Jenna to danger. A fraction of a second later, Jenna could tell what direction the threat came from.

"Sandy! Charge to the right, between those two machines!" Jenna shouted, pointing. Sandy started running forward on all fours, her sharp front claws easily gouging small holes into the concrete floor. "It's invisible, so use your other senses to detect its position." Silver tugged on Jenna shirt, and she looked to see that he was pointing into the air above the machines that Sandy was heading towards. "It's going to be above you, Sandy, so climb on the equipment and then use night slash!"

Jenna herself moved farther away from the walls, into a part of the room relatively unoccupied by machines. Right now, she valued mobility more than protection for her back. As she positioned herself, she released another pokemon. Now, a tyranitar towered between her and the enemy, giving further protection. Sand began to fly from the dark gaps between Rasu's outermost layer of scales and a wind picked up around him, creating a small sandstorm.

"Rasu, cut the sandstorm and prepare yourself for a dark pulse attack," Jenna commanded quietly, moving herself so that she could watch Sandy's progress. Sandy was now reaching the top of the equipment; she had no sooner reached the top than she launched herself into the air, a shadowy energy surrounding her claws.

"Now, Rasu!" Jenna whispered urgently.

The tyranitar's own shadowy energy, which had been rapidly accumulating around his body, now launched itself forwards. Based on its trajectory, the silent missile of darkness appeared as if it would hit Sandy just as the shrew would reach the apex of her jump.

Before it could happen, though, Sandy was slammed down to the ground with tremendous force. Jenna allowed herself a small grin of triumph; though she doubted her tyranitar's attack had gone unnoticed, she hoped that dealing with Sandy had been enough occupy the unknown pokemon and keep it in one place.

Another second later, her gamble was confirmed as a success. The dark pulse made contact with the creature, and for a brief moment as the creature cried out, Jenna was able to faintly see what she was fighting.

At first glance, it seemed to be a giant mass of whirling shadows. Small slivers of darkness were continually falling off of the main body, obscuring all but the most general outline from view. The only thing she could say for certain was that the slivers of darkness she observed seemed almost like large feathers in both their shape and in how they drifted through the air before dissolving and returning to their owner. However, on a deeper level, Jenna was able to see something through the feathers, guiding the overall movement of the shadows.

_A giant bird skeleton,_ Jenna thought. _Hadn't the director said that a skeleton was originally discovered in this basement?_

Jenna saw all this in the split second the bird was visible, and took in every detail thanks to the adrenaline coursing through her body. And then the creature was gone again, leaving no visible trace that it had ever been there in the first place.

"Silver, keep on watching where it goes. If Silver says it approaches, then I want you, Rasu, to launch another dark pulse at wherever Silver indicates. As I suspected, it seems to work well." Jenna glanced over at the ground beneath where the bird had just been. A small crater was there in the concrete, with Sandy knocked out at the center. That gave Jenna an idea of just how strong this bird was; after all, it took a lot of force to pulverize solid concrete like that. Sandy had been a necessary sacrifice in order to get that first hit, but Jenna still wished it could've been avoided.

Silver let out a warning call, snapping Jenna out of her regret. Rasu immediately fired off a dark pulse in the direction that Silver pointed, but it hit nothing. Apparently, the creature had dodged.

_I can't be dwelling on Sandy. I have to focus on the battle._ Jenna watched Silver's movements. He kept turning his head in wide arcs as he did his best to sense where the being was. _Looks like the vulture is circling… In that case…_

Jenna grabbed another pokemon, and this time a nidoqueen appeared. The pokemon roared and looked around angrily, searching for her opponent. "It's invisible, and it's currently flying around us, looking for an opening to attack me," Jenna explained to her nidoqueen, Stella. "I need you to start charging for a thunderbolt. Follow Silver's gaze to find the opponent's position, but don't launch the attack until I give the word." Electricity started accumulating along her dorsal spikes, arcing back and forth vigorously as Stella prepared to use the electric attack.

"Now Silver, I know that thunderbolt is a fast attack, but try and guide it as best you can towards the target. As long as you can keep it away from all the metal machinery, it should arc automatically towards the bird. All right?"

Silver nodded.

"Stella, now!"

All the accumulated electricity raced up Stella's spikes and into the horn on her forehead before shooting forward through the air. Jenna watched as best she could, but before she could blink, the bolt of electricity raced into a particularly large machine and dissipated.

Jenna frowned at Silver. "Are you unable to keep the electric current on track?"

Silver shook his head vigorously, then placed one of his talons on Jenna's forehead. She knew immediately what had happened; the bird had somehow dived into the floor to avoid the thunderbolt, and now Silver couldn't tell where it would come up again.

Before Jenna could even register just how bad that made the situation, the room darkened and a strong wind began to blow. Shadowy feathers from the bird filled every gust, and though they disappeared on contact, the damage they inflicted was nowhere near as fleeting.

Jenna was blown off of her feet almost immediately, and the wind slammed her up against her tyranitar's solid body. Between that impact and the constant wind, Jenna wasn't sure if she'd be able to stand again. Silver, too, was feeling the full force of the wind; he was already on his knees.

_I've never seen an ominous wind this strong, or this widespread,_ Jenna thought, seeing that the entire room was being filled with the gusts of feathers. _And though Stella and Rasu seem to be holding up well, I've got to counter it before Silver is completely knocked out. _

"Rasu! Use sandstorm!" Jenna was blasted away from her tyranitar's side as sand burst from between the scales, with much more force than when he had first entered the battle. Carried by the wind that already filled the room, the myriad particles went much faster and much farther than Rasu could have managed by himself, even in a sandier place. For a few moments, Jenna shut her eyes and huddled down on the floor, focusing on staying conscious. As long as both the sandstorm and the ominous wind were circulating throughout the room, the damage being dealt was almost too much for a non-pokemon to bear.

However, after another ten seconds had passed, Jenna heard a bird-like screech as the wind died down greatly.

"Okay, Rasu, cut the sandstorm. It knows now that we'll use its own attack against it, so I doubt it'll try ominous wind again," Jenna said as she struggled upward. Her side was hurting again, and her lungs felt pained from breathing in sand in their already weakened state.

She walked over to Silver and helped him off the ground. As she put his arm around her shoulders, she said, "I know you're weakened, but can you still sense where the bird is?"

Still leaning against Jenna, Silver closed his eyes. Jenna closed her eyes as well, hoping to catch even the slightest sound out of the ordinary. She heard the gritty sound of sliding sand as she moved her own feet to better support Silver; she heard her other two pokemon, shifting and turning; she heard the mechanical whir of the few machines that were still on. But she didn't hear even the slightest rustling of feathers that might warn of the pokemon's approach.

_Then again, what did I expect to hear? It's practically a god of the dead, and it's probably a ghost-type pokemon. If a ghost wants to sneak around, there's no reason it would make any noise. _

Suddenly, Jenna felt Silver jerk his head upwards to look at the ceiling. Jenna opened her eyes and looked up as well. She had only a moment to take in the sight: the bird, this time fully visible in its shadow feathers, diving down towards herself and her pokemon. Then the moment was up, and Jenna and her pokemon were sent flying as the bird landed, its massive wings brushing each of them aside as if they were nothing more than untrained magikarp.

Jenna struggled up from the ground once again, and saw her pokemon nearby attempting to do the same. Miraculously, she still had her bag with her; as long as she had that, she could bring out her other two pokemon. Jenna brought herself to a sitting position and reached for another pokeball, all the while bringing her head slowly upwards.

At the moment she grabbed her next pokeball, her eyes met the pure white eyes of the beast. Jenna found herself suddenly frozen with fear, unable to even press the release mechanism to call out her next pokemon from its pokeball.

Then the bird opened its bone beak and let out a bloodcurdling screech.

_A victory cry._

That was the last thought Jenna had before the beast reached out with its talons and grabbed her, piercing cleanly through her torso.

* * *

Ouch... That's gotta hurt... *sob*... I'm sorry Jenna...

This isn't the last chapter, just so you know. I wanted to wrap it up all in this chapter, but Jenna being stabbed all the way through her body couldn't _not_ be a chapter ending. I'm going to finish up the story right now, though, so it'll probably be up in the next couple of hours. What more could possibly happen now that Jenna has been defeated, you ask? Well, a certain someone probably didn't leave the stairway, first of all... That might have something to do with the next chapter. Then again, it might not, so I guess you'll just have to wait and see.

As always, thanks to Redemmo for your continuing reviews~! And that question you had should get answered in the next chapter, so bear with me until I post the last chapter. But no, I haven't just forgotten the butler.


	8. And So It Ends

Disclaimer: I do not own mamepato, chiraamii, hihidaruma, meguroko, munna, or giaru. And man, am I proud of myself for already remembering all those japanese pokemon names that will probably be changed for the English language games, making my efforts to remember them all for naught. I just can never remember that silly little zebra's name...

* * *

**Towering Retribution**

Part Eight: And So It Ends

Pain was the only thing that Jenna could think about. Even as she looked at her wounds, she couldn't think about her imminent death. All she could focus on was the pain.

And just like she could think of nothing else but the pain, she could look at nothing else but her wound. The claw that had entered through her back could be seen poking through the front of her shirt, and the two-inch-thick bone-talons that had entered her front were buried deep inside her chest. Blood was seeping all over her tattered clothes. Her injuries were gruesome and undoubtedly fatal. Even if she couldn't think it clearly, she knew it somewhere in the back of her mind: she was dying.

At the edges of her vision, Jenna noticed feathery shadows began to coil around her body, and she felt the pain receding slightly. _That'd be the shock blocking out the pain,_ Jenna thought to herself dimly. She felt her body lift off the ground as the bird took flight, but she no longer cared. She would be dead in a few seconds, whether she could feel the injury or not. All she had to do was wait.

Having already reached the conclusion the she should be dead momentarily, Jenna was surprised when she actually felt her body touching gently to the ground a few seconds later. She looked down at her shirt to see if maybe the wound hadn't been so bad, only to see that there _was_ no wound at all.

"JENNA!"

She sat up quickly and looked around, trying to figure out where the voice was coming from. _Is this what dying is like? You recover from your wounds, and then hear voices?_ But no, that couldn't be right. As Jenna looked around, she could see from the machinery around her that she was still in the basement where the battle had been held.

More importantly, she could see the bird crouched over her. Either side of its massive body easily reached into the machines five feet on either side of Jenna, and at her proximity to the beast, she couldn't even look at the entire thing at once. _That _was how big it was. This was also the first chance she'd had to really examine it, and though she had other things to worry about, she did take the opportunity. Other than the white beak and empty eyes, it actually looked quite similar to a murkrow. As long as she could ignore the fact that its legs were bones, its feathers were shadows, and its full skeleton could still be seen through its body, it could've just been a giant murkrow.

_Oh, who am I kidding. A murkrow can't kill me. This thing, on the other hand, probably already has. Perhaps I'm just a ghost, tied to this bird and this tower like all the other ghosts we've met over the past few days…_

_Ghost we've met…_

_We..._

_Evan!_

That was the voice she had heard calling out her name. Despite the imminent danger that lay in front of her, she sat up and tried to look around, searching for either Evan or her pokemon. She tried to call out, but her voice refused to work.

Then, through the narrow gap between two machines, she saw Evan and the pokemon she had been using. Rasu and Evan were both bending over a figure lying down on the ground. With a shock, Jenna recognized it as herself.

_No no no! It can't be me! I want to believe I'm still alive! _Desperately, she looked around to find something to reassure herself. Stella was still in a battle-ready stance; of course, even if Jenna was dead, she knew that Stella wouldn't care. All the nidoqueen would be concerned about was finishing the battle. Jenna looked for something else for comfort.

It was Silver's actions that really caught Jenna's attention. He wasn't mourning over the body with Evan and Rasu. Instead, his stance was still ready for battle, and he continued to look around. Maybe it was just wishful thinking, but Jenna got the feeling that he wasn't just preparing for another attack. Maybe he was searching for his trainer, because out of all the pokemon in the battle, he would be the only one to see the illusion for what it was.

_That's it… All of this was an illusion. That has to be it. I hope that's it. But if that's the case… Why didn't it kill me?_

Jenna turned slowly back to the bird. Almost as soon as she locked eyes with it once again, the feathers on its body began to stretch and twist straight towards her. Jenna tried to scream for help, but the words got caught in her throat.

Then the shadows engulfed her, and her mind entered a state halfway between thought and dreams.

:::::::::::::::::::

"Good Arceus, would you stop shaking me? I've got a headache enough as it is," Jenna mumbled as she slowly came back to consciousness.

"Jenna? Are you really okay?" Jenna finally forced her eyes open to see Evan, Silver, Rasu, and even Sandy leaning over her.

Silver and Evan helped Jenna as she pushed herself off the ground and into a sitting position. They drug her back a little until she felt herself leaning against something metallic. She looked around to see that she was still in the basement. The bird was gone. For the moment, at least.

"Yeah, I think I'm okay. Aside from the fact that I'm pretty sure I ought to be dead by now. Could you tell me what in the world just happened?"

A couple of tears fell down Evan's cheeks, though to his credit, he completely ignored them. He must've been really relieved; Jenna had never taken him to be the kind of guy who would cry. "To be honest, I'm not sure," Evan said. "I saw the bird stab you with its talons. Then it disappeared, leaving… well… Let's just say that I'm so glad you're still alive."

"Then how'd you find me?" Jenna could tell that she wasn't at the place where she had 'died'. Rather, she was still where the bird had brought her.

"The body – that is, your body, I guess – it just disappeared. Then Silver dashed off, and we followed him to find you here. You seemed a bit bruised up, but not… not…"

"Dead," Jenna finished. "I know, it surprised me too. I remember being pierced through by the bird, and feeling the pain from that… but that's where my memory differs from yours. The bird picked me up, took me over here… I could even see the fake dead body, and you guys around it. Silver, you could tell I hadn't been killed, couldn't you?"

Silver didn't respond, but the gem in his forehead glowed momentarily. Jenna took that as a yes.

"Well, anyway," she continued, "Then the bird forced me unconscious somehow, and then…" Jenna's eyes widened. Only now did she start to remember what she had seen and thought and been told while she'd been unconscious. Most of it was just fragments, images and ideas that she could barely recall before they slipped away again.

The only things she could remember clearly were the things she needed to do.

"Help me up, would you," Jenna commanded rather than asked.

Evan helped her up, though he didn't attempt to hide his confusion. "What's going on? Is that thing coming back?"

"No, but if I don't do a couple things, it might change its mind about killing me," Jennas said calmly. She spied her bag nearby and went over to it, pulling out her last two pokeballs from it.

She let her last two pokemon – a ninetails and a charizard – out, then turned to all of her pokemon. "Sandy and Silver, you're both too damaged to help out with this, so I'll ask the two of you to stay with me. As for the rest of you… I want you to tear down all this equipment in here. I don't want you guys being hurt in the process, so be careful about it. I've been promised that the walls are stable enough that the whole place won't collapse from the chaos, so there's no need to worry about that."

"Jenna, what are talking about!" Evan shouted incredulously. "We can't just destroy all this!

Jenna glared at him. "Yes we can, and yes we will. I'll tell you more about the 'why' once we're over at the stairs and out of harm's way."

Evan still seemed quite certain that Jenna was crazy, but he followed her over to the stairs anyway.

"So will you tell me now why I'm allowing this to happen?" He said as they sat in the stairway, gesturing towards an explosion caused by Rasu's hyper beam.

Jenna rubbed her temples and closed her eyes. "After the bird knocked me out, I had dreams. Or maybe they weren't dreams. They sort of reminded me of the telepathy thing that Silver can do with me, except this was with images as well.

"I can only remember bits… I remember that the bird more or less affirmed our suspicions, that it draws the spirits of the dead to itself. On that note, it also mentioned that it destroyed the butler ghost that was following me; it seemed like it was trying to prove that it wasn't evil by telling me that, at least in the sense that the butler was.

"I saw people from hundreds of years ago, building the tower to honor the creature we met. Then people forgot about it, or something like that. Pokémon Tower became a graveyard only, and not a place of worship for the creature.

"And then it was outraged with the graves being removed. That's why all this happened. I don't remember much more than that, and I don't remember why it didn't just kill me earlier if it was so powerful, but I do remember that it wanted me to immediately clear out this basement. It's where the thing lives. And it wants me to make sure that this place goes back to being Pokémon Tower, rather than a radio tower." Jenna opened her eyes and turned to look at Evan. "You up for helping me convince the director to clear out this entire tower and turn it back into a graveyard?"

In response, Evan did something that Jenna didn't expect; he grabbed her hand and held it tightly in his own. "After you just died and came back to life to try the only other solution? Of course I'll help. Besides, if your pokemon keep this up, he won't have much of a choice," Evan said, his face illuminated by the glow of burning machinery.

:::::::::::::::::::::::::::::

The pokemon center was already undergoing renovations to fix the burn damages from the previous night, so Jenna was forced to bunk on the couch in Evan's parents' house. Jenna found it rather hard to fall asleep after all the excitement of the day, so she tried to work out exactly how she felt about all this.

Of course, she was disappointed that she'd lost one of the few battles in her life that had actually been significant. And between the broken ribs, weak lungs, sandstorm/ominous wind combo, and the phantom wound to her chest (which, to her chagrin, did end up quite as sore as if she really _had _been stabbed, but then had miraculously healed)… Well, needless to say, she was perhaps just a little bit sore.

On the other hand, she felt oddly satisfied with her day's work. She'd had her first interesting battle in years and, after that was over, she'd immediately talked to those involved in this whole mess in order to turn Pokémon Tower back to normal. The director of Kanto Radio Company had immediately agreed to cancel all further ambitions concerning the site, and Fuji was planning to move the graves back to Pokémon Tower first thing tomorrow morning.

The director, Fuji, Evan, and herself were the only ones that knew what had happened. _And_, Jenna thought to herself as she drifted into slumber_, we'll stay the only ones that know. The director doesn't want to panic the citizens, and we all agreed not to mention that monstrous bird to anyone. _It was cool to think that she'd be one of only four people in the entire world to know about something as big as this.

_~And you really think that I'll just let you humans out into the world with all your memories intact?~ _An almost-voice said in Jenna's mind. Jenna turned in her sleep as the not-voice continued, ~_True, I can't completely wipe the memory from your mind… Unexplained gaps in memory cause more trouble than they're worth. Especially so soon after something huge like this occurred. But I can make it so that you can only remember it when you need to, and so that you soon forget it when the memory comes to your mind. To you, it will be nothing more than another of the myriad pokemon battles you have partaken in, and it will be an insignificant one at that.~_

_~Despite the fact that I have to do this to you… Still, I thank you.~_

Jenna turned in her sleep once more and smiled, before slipping into a deeper, more restful slumber.

* * *

Okay, and that's the end! Sorry that I pulled a "main character comes back from the dead", but I'm hoping I mostly subverted the trope by showing first thing this chapter that she never really died... I hate stuff where people come back from the dead... It annoys me _so_ much... Why don't people just stay dead every once and a while in stories?

Anyway, thanks to anyone who reads this story! I hope the few people who actually read it all the way through enjoyed it! I hope to be starting up my next pokemon fanfic here pretty soon, so I hope you'll look for that~!


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